The Sable Cloud, page 179 by Nehemiah Adams
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to government, and he leaves Christianity to regulate it as circumstances shall make it proper. If any one says that the Apostle was afraid to meddle with it, I reply, that there was never anything yet that Paul was afraid to meddle with, if it was right to do so. He "meddled" with Diana of the Ephesians and her craftsmen; he "meddled" with the "beasts" there; he "meddled" with idolatry on Mars Hill at Athens, I being witness; he has been beaten, stoned, imprisoned, and is now the second time before Nero for his life. Afraid to "meddle" with slavery! I am ashamed of the man who makes the suggestion. He who thinks it, has never yet understood him.
"'Now, where in all his teachings has he ever intimated that it is wrong to hold property in man? Nowhere; I repeat it, nowhere. But is he ignorant of the nature of slavery? We all know what has lately happened at Rome, in connection with slavery. The very year that Paul arrives at Rome, the prefect of the city, Pedanius Secundus, was murdered by his slave; and agreeably to the laws of slavery all the slaves belonging to the prefect, a great number, women and children among them, were put to death indiscriminately, though innocent of the crime.[A] Such is slavery under the Apostle's eye; and yet'--
[Footnote A: Tacitus, Annals, xiv. 42.--A thrilling tale. See Bohn's Classical Library, 53.]
"'And, therefore,' interrupted the Laodicean brother, 'the Apostle approves of murdering innocent slaves for the sin of one. That is the conclusion to which your reasoning will bring us.'
"'Excusing the brother for interrupting me, I ask, Is that agreeable to the plain facts in the case?' said the speaker. 'Are the abuses of parentage chargeable upon the relationship of parent and child? Moreover, does not the Apostle expressly teach us, in this Epistle, that such things are wrong? but still, does he condemn the relation of master and slave?
"'The tale of that horrid butchery was present to the mind of the Apostle when he sends Onesimus back