cultivating
their fields and producing their luxuries! Encouragement and support
do they derive from James, in maintaining the "peculiar institution"
which they call patriarchal, and boast of as the "corner-stone" of
the republic?

In the New Testament, we have, moreover, the general injunction,
"_Honor all men_." Under this broad precept, every form of humanity
may justly claim protection and respect. The invasion of any human
right must do dishonor to humanity, and be a transgression of this
command. How then, in the light of such obligations, must slavery be
regarded? Are those men honored, who are rudely excluded from a
place in the human family, and shut up to the deep degradation and
nameless horrors of chattelship? _Can they be held as slaves, and at
the same time be honored as men_?

How far, in obeying this command, we are to go, we may infer from
the admonitions and instructions which James applies to the
arrangements and usages of religious assemblies. Into these he can
not allow "respect of persons" to enter. "My brethren," he exclaims,
"have not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory,
with respect of persons. For if there come unto your assembly a
man with a gold ring, in goodly apparel; and there come in also
a poor man in vile raiment; and ye have respect to him that weareth
the gay clothing, and say unto him, sit thou here in a good place;
and say to the poor, stand thou there, or sit here under my footstool;
are ye not then partial in yourselves, and are become judges of evil
thoughts?" _If ye have respect to persons, ye commit sin, and are
convinced of the law as transgressors_. On this general principle,
then, religious assemblies ought to be regulated--that every man is
to be estimated, not according to his _circumstances_--not according
to anything incidental to his _condition_; but according to his _moral
worth_--according to the essential features and vital elements of his
_character_. Gold rings and gay clothing, as they qualify no man for,
can entitle no man to, a "good place" in the church. Nor can the
"vile raiment of the poor man," fairly exclude him from any sphere,
however exalted, which his heart and head may fit him to fill. To
deny this, in theory or practice, is to degrade a man below a thing;
for what are gold rings, or gay clothing, or vile raiment, but things,
"which perish with the using?" And this must be "to commit sin, and
be convinced of the law as transgressor