the subject of slavery, in which they specifically enumerated the respects in which they considered it to be unchristian. The eighth resolution was as follows:
That any member of our church, who shall advocate or speak in favor of such laws as have been or may yet be enacted, for the purpose of keeping the slaves in ignorance, and preventing them from learning to read the word of God, is guilty of a great sin, and ought to be dealt with as for other scandalous crimes.
This remonstrance was answered by Rev. James Smylie, stated clerk of the Mississippi Presbytery, and afterwards of the Amity Presbytery of Louisiana, in a pamphlet of eighty-seven pages, in which he defended slavery generally and particularly, in the same manner in which all other abuses have always been defended—by the word of God. The tenth section of this pamphlet is devoted to the defence of this law. He devotes seven pages of fine print to this object. He says (p. 63):
There are laws existing in both states, Mississippi and Louisiana, accompanied with heavy penal sanctions, prohibiting the teaching of the slaves to read, and meeting the approbation of the religious part of the reflecting community. *****
He adds, still further:
The laws preventing the slaves from learning to read are a fruitful source of much ignorance and immorality among the slaves. The printing, publishing, and circulating of abolition and emancipatory principles in those states, was the cause of the passage of those laws.
He then goes on to say that the ignorance and vice which are the consequence of those laws do not properly belong to those who made the laws, but to those whose emancipating doctrines rendered them necessary. Speaking of these consequences of ignorance and vice, he says:
Upon whom must they be saddled? If you will allow me to answer the question, I will answer by saying. Upon such great and good men as John Wesley, Jonathan Edwards, Bishop Porteus, Paley, Horsley, Scott, Clark, Wilberforce, Sharpe, Clarkson, Fox, Johnson, Burke, and other great and good men, who, without examining the word of God, have concluded that it is a true maxim that slavery is in itself sinful.
He then illustrates the necessity of these laws by the following simile. He supposes that the doctrine had been promulgated that the authority of parents was an unjust usurpation, and that it was getting a general hold of society; that societies were being formed for the emancipation of children from the control of their parents: that all books were beginning to be pervaded by this sentiment; and that, under all these influences, children were becoming restless and fractious. He supposes that, under these circumstances, parents meet and refer the subject to legislators. He thus describes the dilemma of the legislators:
These meet, and they take the subject seriously and solemnly into consideration. On the one hand, they perceive that, if their children had access to these doctrines, they were ruined forever. To let them have access to them was unavoidable, if they taught them to read. To prevent their being taught to read was cruel, and would prevent them from obtaining as much knowledge of the laws of Heaven as otherwise they might enjoy. In this sad dilemma, sitting and consulting in a legislative capacity, they must, of two evils, choose the least. With indignant feelings towards those, who, under the influence of "seducing spirits," had sent and were sending among them "doctrines of devils," but with aching hearts towards their children, they resolved that their children should not be taught to read, until the storm should be overblown; hoping that Satan's being let loose will be but for a little season. And during this season they will have to teach them orally, and thereby guard against their being contaminated by these wicked doctrines.
So much for that law.
Now, as for the internal slave-trade,—the very essence of that trade is the buying and selling of human beings for the mere purposes of gain.
A master who has slaves transmitted to him, or a master who buys slaves with the purpose of retaining them on his plantation or in his family, can be supposed to have some object in it besides the mere purpose of gain. He may be supposed, in certain cases, to have some regard to the happiness or well-being of the slave. The trader buys and sells for the mere purpose of gain.
Concerning this abuse the Chillicothe Presbytery, in the document to which we have alluded, passed the following resolution:
Resolved, That the buying, selling, or holding of a slave, for the sake of gain, is a heinous sin and scandal, requiring the cognizance of the judicatories of the church.
In the reply from which we have already quoted, Mr. Smylie says (p. 13):
If the buying, selling and holding of a slave for the sake of gain, is, as you say, a heinous sin and scandal, then verily three-fourths of all Episcopalians, Methodists, Baptists and Presbyterians, in the eleven states of the Union, are of the devil. *****
Again:
To question whether slave-holders or slave-buyers
are of the devil, seems to me like calling in
