traders allege, for instance, that they shall "adorn the doctrine of God our Savior," (Titus ii. 10,) by persisting
between masters and slaves "was looked upon by him as absolutely unlawful, so that the former had no right to rule the latter;" for this I have demonstrated, I trust, by other authorities of scripture equally authentic, and much less liable to be misunderstood. My attempt to explain the texts in question extends no further than to show that they do not really justify the uncharitable claims of the modern slaveholders, though they are frequently cited for that purpose.
An attempt to show that any particular doctrine is not necessarily implied in a certain text or texts of scripture, is a very different thing from an attempt to prove or authenticate an opposite doctrine by the same text of scripture! For instance, when my learned friend asserts, as above, that the apostle to the Colossians, iii.
25, "very clearly signifies that the right of dominion remained, when he opposes doing wrong to obeying in all things their masters." &c. I do not pretend to build au opposite doctrine upon the very same words, but shall only endeavour to show that this supposed "right of dominion" is not necessarily implied in the text
which my friend has cited in support of it.
The servants are indeed expressly and plainly exhorted to obedience and submission, as well in this as in all the other texts before recited, so that a contrary behavior in them might certainly be esteemed a "doing wrong" on their part, yet this by no means implies "a right of dominion" vested in the master; for that would prove too much; because the like submission is elsewhere equally enjoined to those who are expressly said to "endure grief, suffering wrongfully," (πασχωυ αδικως,) and we cannot suppose (as I have before observed) that the submission enjoined implies a right in masters to exercise such a dominion as that of oppressing others unjustly, or αδικως; for that could not possibly tend to promote the declared purposes of the apostle's exhortations, viz: "that the name of God and his doctrine be not blasphemed," (1 Tim. vi.) And again, "that they may adorn the doctrine
of God in all things," (Titus ii. 9). These purposes, however, are fully answered in the advice given by the same apostle to all the other different relations of life mentioned by my worthy friend. Wives may "adorn the doctrine of God" by submission to their "own husbands, as it is fit in the Lord." (See Coloss, iii. 18.) And husbands by love to their wives: for they are expressly charged in the following verse "not to be bitter against them," that is, they must, by love and sincere affection, moderate and soften that supreme authority with which husbands are entrusted, (by the laws of God and man,) that they may rule rather by the gentle influence of an inviolable love and fidelity, as so good an
