uffering
children? Or that He who raised up a Moses, an Aaron, and a Miriam, to
bring them up out of the land of Egypt from the house of bondage, cannot
now, with a high hand and a stretched out arm, rid the poor negroes out
of the hands of their masters? Surely you believe that his arm is _not_
shortened that he cannot save. And would not such a work of mercy
redound to his glory? But another string of the harp of prophecy
vibrates to the song of deliverance: "But they shall sit every man under
his vine, and under his fig-tree, and _none shall make them afraid_; for
the mouth of the Lord of Hosts hath spoken it." The _slave_ never can do
this as long as he is a _slave_; whilst he is a "chattel personal" he
can own _no_ property; but the time _is to come_ when _every_ man is to
sit under _his own_ vine and _his own_ fig-tree, and no domineering
driver, or irresponsible master, or irascible mistress, shall make him
afraid of the chain or the whip. Hear, too, the sweet tones of another
string: "Many shall run to and fro, and _knowledge_ shall be increased."
Slavery is an insurmountable barrier to the increase of knowledge in
every community where it exists; _slavery, then, must be abolished
before_ this prediction can be fulfiled. The last chord I shall touch,
will be this, "They shall _not_ hurt nor destroy in all my holy
mountain."
_Slavery, then, must be overthrown before_ the prophecies can be
accomplished, but how are they to be fulfiled? Will the wheels of the
millennial car be rolled onward by miraculous power? No! God designs to
confer this holy privilege upon _man_; it is through _his_
instrumentality that the great and glorious work of reforming the world
is to be done. And see you not how the mighty engine of _moral power_ is
dragging in its rear the Bible and peace societies, anti-slavery and
temperance, sabbath schools, moral reform, and missions? or to adopt
another figure, do not these seven philanthropic associations compose
the beautiful tints in that bow of promise which spans the arch of our
moral heaven? Who does not believe, that if these societies were broken
up, their constitutions burnt, and the vast machinery with which they
are laboring to regenerate mankind was stopped, that the black clouds of
vengeance would soon burst over our world, and every city would witness
the fate of the devoted cities of the plain? Each one of these societies
is walking abroad through the earth scattering the seeds o
|