that he was a master of slaves, said: "I will not, I cannot

justify it. However culpable my conduct, I will so far pay my devoir to virtue, as to own the excellence and rectitude of her precepts, and lament my want of conformity to them." At this very period, in the Legislature of Maryland, on a bill for the relief of oppressed slaves, a young man, afterwards by his consummate learning and forensic powers, the acknowledged head of the American bar, William Pinkney, in a speech of earnest, truthful eloquence-better far for his memory than his transcendent professional fame - branded Slavery as "iniquitious and most dishonorable; ""founded in a disgraceful traffic;" "as shameful in its continuance as in its origin;" and he openly declared, that, "By the eternal principles of natural justice, no master in the State has a right to hold his slave in bondage a single hour."

Thus at this time spoke the NATION. The CHURCH also joined its voice. And here, amidst the diversities of religious faith, it is instructive to observe the general accord. The Quakers first bore their testimony. At the adoption of the Constitution, their whole body, under the early teaching of George Fox, and by the crowning exertions of Benezet and 'Woolman, had become an organized band of Abolitionists, penetrated by the conviction that it was unlawful to hold a fellow-man in bondage. The Methodists, numerous, earnest, and faithful, never ceased by their preachers to proclaim the same truth. Their rules in 1788 denounced, in formal language, "the buying or selling of bodies and souls of men, women, and children, with an intention to enslave them." The words of their great apostle, John Wesley, were constantly repeated. On the eve of the National Convention the burning tract was circulated, in which he exposes American slavery as the "vilest" of the world "such Slavery as is not found among the Turks at Algiers;" and, after declaring "Liberty the birthright of every human creature, of which no human law can deprive him," he pleads, "If, therefore, you have any regard to justice, (to say nothing of mercy or the revealed law of God,) render unto all their due. Give liberty to whom liberty is due, that is, to every child of man, to every partaker

of human nature." At the same time, the Presbyterians, a powerful religious body, inspired by the principles of John Calvin, in more moderate language, but by a public act, recorded their judgment, recommending "to all the people under their care to use the most prudent measures consistent with the interest and the state of civil society, to procure eventually the final abolition of Slavery in America." The Congregationalists of New-England, also of the faith of John Calvin, and with the hatred of Slavery belonging to the great nonconformist, Richard Baxter, were sternly united against this wrong. As early as 1776, Samuel Hopkins, their eminent leader and divine, published his tract, showing it to be the Duty and Interest of the American States to Emancipate all 'their African slaves, and declaring that "Slavery is in every instance wrong, unrighteous, and oppressive — a very great and crying sin—there being nothing of the kind equal to it on the face of the earth." And, in 1791, shortly after the adoption of the Constitution, the second Jonathan Edwards, a twice-honored name, in an elaborate discourse often published, called upon his country, "in the present blaze of light" on the injustice of slavery, to prepare the way for "its total abolition." This he gladly thought at hand. "If we judge of the future by the past," said the celebrated preacher, "within fifty years from this time, it will be as shameful for a man to hold a negro slave, as to be guilty of common robbery or theft."

Thus, at this time, the Church, in harmony with the Nation, by its leading denominations, Quakers, Methodists, Presbyterians, and Congregationalists, thundered against Slavery. The COLLEGES were in unison with the Church. Harvard University spoke by the voice of Massachusetts, which had already abolished Slavery. Dartmouth College, by one of its learned Professors, claimed for the slaves "equal privileges with the whites." Yale College, by its President, the eminent divine, Ezra Stiles, became the head of the Abolition Society of Connecticut. And the University of William and Mary, in Virginia, testified its sympathy with this cause at this very time, by conferring upon Granville Sharpe, the acknowledged

chief of British Abolitionists, the honorary degree of Doctor of Laws.

The LITERATURE of the land, such as then existed, agreed with the Nation, the Church and the College. Franklin, in the last literary labor of his life; Jefferson, in his Notes on Virginia; Barlow, in his measured verse; Rush, in a work which inspired the praise of Clarkson; the ingenious author of the Algerine Captive -the earliest American novel, and though now but little known, one of the earliest American books republished in London - were all moved by the contemplation of Slavery. "If our fellow-citizens of the Southern States are deaf to the pleadings of nature," the latter exclaims in his work, "I will conjure them, for the sake of consistency, to cease to deprive their fellow-creatures of freedom, which their writers, their orators, representatives, and senators, and even their Constitution of Government, have declared to be the inalienable birthright of man." A female writer and poet, earliest in our country among the graceful throng, Sarah Wentworth Morton, at the very period of the National Convention admired by the polite society in which she lived, poured forth her sympathies also. The generous labors of John Jay in behalf of the crushed African inspired her muse; and, in another poem, commemorating a slave, who fell while vindicating his Freedom, she rendered a truthful homage to his inalienable rights, in words which I now quote as part of the testimony of the times:

"Does not the voice of reason cry,

'Claim the first right that Nature gave; From the red scourge of bondage fly,

Nor deign to live a burdened slave?'"'

Such, sir, at the adoption of the Constitution and at the first organization of the National Government, was the outspoken, unequivocal heart of the country. Slavery was abhorred. Like the slave trade, it was regarded as temporary; and, by many, it was supposed that they would both disappear together. As the oracles ceased or grew mute at the coming of Christ, and a voice was heard, crying to mariners at sea, "Great Pan is dead," so at this time Slavery became dumb,

and its death seemed to be near. Voices of Freedom filled the air. The patriot, the Christian, the scholar, the writer, the poet, vied in loyalty to this cause. All were Abolitionists.

Glance now at the earliest Congress under the Constitution. From various quarters memorials were presented to this body against Slavery. Among these was one from the Abolition Society of Virginia, wherein Slavery is pronounced "not only an odious degradation, but an outrageous violation of one of the most essential rights of human nature, and utterly repugnant to the precepts of the Gospel." Still another, of a more important character, came from the Abolition Society of Pennsylvania, and was signed by Benjamin Franklin, as President. This venerable man, whose active life had been devoted to the welfare of mankind at home and abroad who, both as philosopher and statesman, had arrested the admiratio of the world - who had ravished the lightning from the skies and the sceptre from a tyrant-who, as a member of the Continental Congress, had set his name to the Declaration of Independence, and, as a member of the National Convention, had again set his name to the Constitution - in whom more, perhaps, than in any other person, was embodied the true spirit of American institutions, at once practical and humane than whom no one could be more familiar with the purposes and aspirations of the founders-this veteran, eightyfour years of age, within a few months of his death, now appeared by petition at the bar of that Congress, whose powers he had helped to define and establish. This was the last political act of his long life. Listen to the prayer of Franklin :

"Your memorialists, particularly engaged in attending to the distresses arising from Slavery, believe it to be their indispensable duty to present this subject to your notice. They have observed with real satisfaction that many important and salutary powers are vested in you for promoting the welfare and securing the blessings of liberty to the people of the United States; and as they conceive that these blessings ought rightfully to be administered, without distinction of color to all descriptions of people, so they indulge themselves in the pleasing expectation, that nothing which can be done for the relief of the unhappy objects of their care, will be either omitted or delayed" "Under these impressions, they earnestly entreat your serious attention to the subject of Slavery;

that you would be pleased to countenance the restoration of liberty to those unhappy men, who alone, in this land of Freedom, are degraded into perpetual bondage, and who, amidst the general joy of surrounding freemen, are groaning in servile subjection; that you will promote mercy and justice towards this distressed race, and that you will step to the very verge of the power vested in you for DISCOURAGING every species of traffic in the persons of our fellow

men."

Important words! in themselves a key-note of the times. From his grave Franklin seems still to call upon Congress to step to the very verge of the powers vested in it to DISCOURAGE SLAVERY'; and, in making this prayer, he proclaims the true national policy of the Fathers. Not encouragement but discouragement of Slavery was their rule.

Sir, enough has been said to show the sentiment which, like a vital air, surrounded the National Government as it stepped into being. In the face of this history, and in the absence of any positive sanction, it is absurd to suppose that Slavery, which under the Confederation was merely sectional, was now constituted a national institution. Our fathers did not say with the apostate angel, "Evil be thou my good!" In a different spirit they cried out to Slavery, "Get thee behind me, Satan!

But there is yet another link in the argument. In the discussions which took place in the local conventions on the adoption of the Constitution, a sensitive desire was manifested to surround all persons under the Constitution with additional safeguards. Fears were expressed, from the supposed indefiniteness of some of the powers conceded to the National Government, and also from the absence of a Bill of Rights. Massachusetts, on ratifying the Constitution, proposed a series of amendments, at the head of which was this, characterized by Samuel Adams, in the Convention, as "A summary of a Bill of Rights:

"That it be explicitly declared, that all powers not expressly delegated by the aforesaid Constitution are reserved to the several States, to be by them exercised."

Virginia, South Carolina, and North Carolina, with minorities in Pennsylvania and Maryland, united in this proposition. In