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These provisions are rather prolix in their details. Should you even attempt to rescue the Fugitive, directly or indirectly, for the said offence you are subject to the penalties herein mentioned. This law is unparalleled in the history of nations, and especially Christian nations. God has commanded us to assist the poor and needy; the helpless, the out-cast, and the down-trodden. Unlike the law of God to Israel, when she assumed an independent position among the nations of the earth, in that He made a provision for the Fugitive Slave. He commanded first of all, that Israel should not turn him back or deliver him to his heathen master from whom he had fled. She was taught her duty towards the Fugitive, evidently showing that the Slave was quite justifiable in the attempt to obtain his freedom, consequently it would be wrong for Israel to deliver him up. As right and wrong are in juxtaposition to each other, both cannot, therefore, be right, though one may be. If the Slave had a right to run away he had a right also to remain away. And if so it was the duty of those to whom he went to protect him in the free and unrestrained exercise of this acknowledged right, which God plainly intimates in the text, Deut. xxiii. 15 and 16: "Thou shalt not deliver unto his master the servant which is escaped from his master unto thee: he shall dwell with thee, even among you, in that place which he shall choose, in one of thy
