The Key to Uncle Tom's Cabin

by Harriet Beecher Stowe

  preaching doctrines that tend to infidelity? And pray where

  does this other doctrine tend? As sure as there is a God in

  heaven is the certainty that, if the Bible really did defend slavery,

  fifty years hence would see every honourable and high-minded

  man an infidel.

  Has, then, the past influence of Congregationalism been ac-

  cording to the nature of the exigency and the weight of the

  subject? But the late convention of Congregationalists at

  Albany, including ministers both from New England and the

  Western States, did take a stronger and more decided ground.

  Here is their resolution:--

  Resolved, That, in the opinion of this convention, it is the tendency of the

  Gospel, wherever it is preached in its purity, to correct all social evils, and to

  destroy sin in all its forms; and that it is the duty of Missionary Societies to grant

  aid to Churches in slaveholding States in the support of such ministers only as

  shall so preach the Gospel, and inculcate the principles and application of Gospel

  discipline, that, with the blessing of God, it shall have its full effect in awakening

  and enlightening the moral sense in regard to slavery, and in bringing to pass the

  speedy abolition of that stupendous wrong; and that wherever a minister is not

  permitted so to preach, he should, in accordance with the directions of Christ,

  “depart out of that city.”

  This resolution is a matter of hope and gratulation in many

  respects. It was passed in a very large convention--the largest

  ever assembled in this country, fully representing the Congrega-

  tionalism of the United States--and the occasion of its meeting

  was considered, in some sort, as marking a new era in the pro-

  gress of this denomination.

  The resolution was passed unanimously. It is decided in its

  expression, and looks to practical action, which is what is

  wanted. It says it will support no ministers in slave States

  whose preaching does not tend to destroy slavery; and that, if

  they are not allowed to preach freely on the subject, they must

  depart.

  That the ground thus taken will be efficiently sustained may

  be inferred from the fact that the Home Missionary Society,

  which is the organ of this body, as well as of the New-School

  Presbyterian Church, has uniformly taken decided ground upon

  this subject in their instructions to missionaries sent into slave

  States. These instructions are ably set forth in their report of

  March, 1853. When application was made to them, in 1850,

  from a slave State, for missionaries who would let slavery alone,

  they replied to them, in the most decided language, that it could

  not be done; that, on the contrary, they must understand that

  one grand object in sending missionaries to slave States is, as

  far as possible, to redeem society from all forms of sin; and

  that, “if utter silence respecting slavery is to be maintained,

  one of the greatest inducements to send or retain missionaries in

  the slave States is taken away.”

  The Society furthermore instructed their missionaries, if they

  could not be heard on this subject in one city or village, to go

  to another; and they express their conviction that their mission-

  aries have made progress in awakening the consciences of the

  people. They say that they do not suffer the subject to sleep;

  that they do not let it alone because it is a delicate subject, but

  they discharge their consciences, whether their message be well

  received, or whether, as in some instances, it subjects them to

  opposition, opprobrium, and personal danger; and that where

  their endeavours to do this have not been tolerated, they have,

  in repeated cases, at great sacrifice, resigned their position, and

  departed to other fields. In their report of this year they also

  quote letters from ministers in slaveholding States, by which it

  appears that they have actually secured, in the face of much

  opposition, the right publicly to preach and propagate their sen-

  timents upon this subject.

  One of these missionaries says, speaking of slavery, “We are

  determined to remove this great difficulty in our way, or die in

  the attempt. As Christians and as freemen, we will suffer this

  libel on our religion and institutions to exist no longer.”

  This is noble ground.

  And while we are recording the protesting power, let us not

  forget the Scotch seceders and covenanters, who, with a perti-

  nacity and decision worthy of the children of the old covenant,

  have kept themselves clear from the sin of slavery, and have uni-

  formly protested against it. Let us remember, also, that the

  Quakers did pursue a course which actually freed all their body

  from the sin of slaveholding; thus showing to all other denomi-

  nations that what has been done once can be done again. Also,

  in all denominations, individual ministers and Christians, in

  hours that have tried men's souls, have stood up to bear their

  testimony. Albert Barnes, in Philadelphia, standing in the

  midst of a great, rich Church, on the borders of a slave State,

  and with all those temptations to complicity which have silenced

  so many, has stood up, in calm fidelity, and declared the whole

  counsel of God upon this subject. Nay, more; he recorded his

  solemn protest that “no influences out of the Church could sustain

  slavery an hour, if it were not sustained in it;” and in the last

  session of the General Assembly, which met at Washington,

  disregarding all suggestions of policy, he boldly held the Presby-

  terian Church up to the strength of her past declarations, and

  declared it her duty to attempt the entire abolition of slavery

  throughout the world. So, in darkest hour, Dr. Channing bore

  a noble testimony in Boston, for which his name shall ever live.

  So, in Illinois, E. P. Lovejoy and Edward Beecher, with their

  associates, formed the Illinois Anti-Slavery Society, amid mobs

  and at the hazard of their lives; and, a few hours after, Lovejoy

  was shot down in attempting to defend the twice-destroyed anti-

  slavery press. In the Old-School Presbyterian Church, William

  and Robert Breckenridge, President Young, and others, have

  preached in favour of emancipation in Kentucky. Le Roy Sun-

  derland, in the Methodist Church, kept up his newspaper under

  ban of his superiors, and with a bribe on his life of fifty thousand

  dollars. Torrey, meekly patient, died in a prison, saying, “If I

  am a guilty man I am a very guilty one: for I have helped four

  hundred slaves to freedom, who but for me would have died

  slaves.” Dr. Nelson was expelled by mobs from Missouri for

  the courageous declaration of the truth on slave soil. All these

  were in the ministry. Nor are these all. Jesus Christ has not

  wholly deserted us yet. There have been those who have learned

  how joyful it is to suffer shame and brave death in a good

  cause.

  Also there have been private Christians who have counted

  nothing too dear for this sacred cause. Witness Richard Dil-

&nbs
p; lingham, and John Garret, and a host of others, who took joy-

  fully the spoiling of their goods.

  But yet, notwithstanding this, the awful truth remains, that

  the whole of what has been done by the Church has not, as yet,

  perceptibly abated the evil. The great system is stronger than

  ever. It is confessedly the dominant power of the nation.

  The whole power of the government, and the whole power of

  the wealth, and the whole power of the fashion, and the practical

  organic workings of the large bodies of the Church, are all gone

  one way. The Church is familiarly quoted as being on the side

  of slavery. Statesmen on both sides of the question have laid

  that down as a settled fact. Infidels point to it with triumph;

  and America, too, is beholding another class of infidels--a class

  that could have grown up only under such an influence. Men

  whose whole life is one study and practice of benevolence are

  now ranked as infidels, because the position of Church organisa-

  tions misrepresents Christianity, and they separate themselves

  from the Church. We would offer no excuse for any infidels

  who take for their religion mere anti-slavery zeal, and, under

  this guise, gratify a malignant hatred of real Christianity. But

  such defences of slavery from the Bible as some of the American

  clergy have made, are exactly fitted to make infidels of all

  honourable and high-minded men. The infidels of olden times

  were not much to be dreaded, but such infidels as these are not

  to be despised. Woe to the Church when the moral standard of

  the infidel is higher than the standard of the professed Christian!

  for the only armour that ever proved invincible to infidelity is

  the armour of righteousness.

  Let us see how the Church organisations work now, prac-

  tically. What do Bruin and Hill, Pulliam and Davis, Bolton,

  Dickins, and Co., and Matthews, Branton, and Co., depend upon

  to keep their slave-factories and slave-barracoons full, and their

  business brisk? Is it to be supposed that they are not men like

  ourselves? Do they not sometimes tremble at the awful work-

  ings of fear and despair and agony which they witness when

  they are tearing asunder living hearts in the depths of those fear-

  ful slave-prisons? What, then, keeps down the consciences of

  these traders? It is the public sentiment of the community

  where they live; and that public sentiment is made by ministers

  and Church members. The trader sees plainly enough a logical

  sequence between the declarations of the Church and the practice

  of his trade. He sees plainly enough that, if slavery is sanc-

  tioned by God, and it is right to set it up in a new territory, it

  is right to take the means to do this; and, as slaves do not grow

  on bushes in Texas, it is necessary that there should be traders

  to gather up coffles, and carry them out there; and, as they

  cannot always take whole families, it is necessary that they

  should part them; and, as slaves will not go by moral suasion,

  it is necessary that they should be forced; and, as gentle force

  will not do, they must whip and torture. Hence come gags,

  thumb-screws, cowhides, blood--all necessary measures of

  carrying out what Christians say God sanctions.

  So goes the argument one way. Let us now trace it back the

  other. The South Carolina and Mississippi Presbyteries main-

  tain opinions which, in their legitimate results, endorse the slave-

  trader. The Old-School General Assembly maintains fellowship

  with these Presbyteries without discipline or protest. The New-

  School Assembly signifies its willingness to re-unite with the Old,

  while, at the same time, it declares the system of slavery an abo-

  mination, a gross violation of its most sacred rights, and so on.

  Well, now the chain is as complete as need be. All parts are in;

  everyone standing in his place, and saying just what is required,

  and no more. The trader does the repulsive work, the Southern

  Church defends him, the Northern Church defends the South.

  Everyone does as much for slavery as would be at all expedient,

  considering the latitude they live in. This is the practical result

  of the thing.

  The melancholy part of the matter is, that while a large body

  of New-School men, and many Old-School, are decided anti-

  slavery men, this denominational position carries their influence

  on the other side. As goes the General Assembly, so goes their

  influence. The following affecting letter on this subject was

  written by that eminently pious man, Dr. Nelson, whose work on

  Infidelity is one of the most efficient popular appeals that has

  ever appeared:--

  I have resided in North Carolina more than forty years, and been intimately

  acquainted with the system, and I can scarcely even think of its operations with-

  out shedding tears. It causes me excessive grief to think of my own poor slaves,

  for whom I have for years been trying to find a free home. It strikes me with

  equal astonishment and horror to hear Northern people make light of slavery.

  Had they seen and known as much of it as I, they could not thus treat it, unless

  callous to the deepest woes and degradations of humanity, and dead both to the

  religion and philanthropy of the Gospel. But many of them are doing just what

  the hardest-hearted tyrants of the South most desire. Those tyrants would not,

  on any account, have them advocate or even apologise for slavery in an unqualified

  manner. This would be bad policy with the North. I wonder that Gerritt Smith

  should understand slavery so much better than most of the Northern people. How

  true was his remark on a certain occasion, namely, that the South are laughing in

  their sleeves to think what dupes they make of most of the people at the North in

  regard to the real character of slavery! Well did Mr. Smith remark that the

  system, carried out on its fundamental principle, would as soon enslave any labour-

  ing white man as the African. But, if it were not for the support of the North,

  the fabric of blood would fall at once; and of all the efforts of public bodies at

  the North to sustain slavery, the Connecticut General Association has made the

  best one. I have never seen anything so well constructed in that line as their

  resolutions of June, 1836. The South certainly could not have asked anything

  more effectual; but, of all Northern periodicals, the New York Observer must

  have the preference as an efficient support of slavery. I am not sure but it does

  more than all things combined to keep the dreadful system alive; it is just the

  succour demanded by the South. Its abuse of the abolitionists is music in

  Southern ears, which operates as a charm; but nothing is equal to its harping

  upon the “religious privileges and instruction” of the slaves of the South, and

  nothing could be so false and injurious (to the cause of freedom and religion) as

  the impression it gives on that subject. I say what I know when I speak in

  relation to this matter. I have been intimately acquainted with the religious

  opportunities of slaves--in the constant habit of hearing the sermons which ar
e

  preached to them, and I solemnly affirm that, during the forty years of my resi-

  dence and observation in this line, I never heard a single one of these sermons

  but what was taken up with the obligations and duties of slaves to their masters;

  indeed, I never heard a sermon to slaves but what made obedience to masters by

  the slaves the fundamental and supreme law of religion. Any candid and intelli-

  gent man can decide whether such preaching is not, as to religious purposes, worse

  than none at all.

  Again: it is wonderful how the credulity of the North is subjected to imposition

  in regard to the kind treatment of slaves. For myself, I can clear up the apparent

  contradictions found in writers who have resided at or visited the South. The

  “majority of slaveholders,” say some, “treat their slaves with kindness.” Now,

  this may be true in certain States and districts, setting aside all questions of treat-

  ment except such as refer to the body. And yet, while the “majority of slave-

  holders” in a certain section may be kind, the majority of slaves in that section

  will be treated with cruelty. This is the truth in many such cases; that while

  there may be thirty men who may have but one slave a-piece, and that a house-

  servant--a single man in their neighbourhood may have a hundred slaves, all field-

  hands, half-fed, worked excessively, and whipped most cruelly. this is what I

  have often seen. To give a case, to show the awful influence of slavery upon the

  master, I will mention a Presbyterian elder, who was esteemed one of the best men

  in the region--a very kind master. I was called to his death-bed to write his

  will. He had what was considered a favourite house-servant, a female. After all

  other things were disposed of, the elder paused, as if in doubt what to do with

  “Sue.” I entertained pleasing expectations of hearing the word “liberty” fall

  from his lips; but who can tell my surprise when I heard the master exclaim,

  “What shall be done with Sue? I am afraid she will never be under a master

  severe enough for her.” Shall I say that both the dying elder and his “Sue” were

  members of the same Church--the latter statedly receiving the emblems of a

  Saviour's dying love from the former?

  All this temporising and concession has been excused on the

  plea of brotherly love. What a plea for us Northern freemen!