ABSTRACT
The principle upon which such inference rests, is fundamentally false, and of extremely dangerous tendency. For it assumes to determine what Christianity is,—what it forbids, and what it enjoins,—not by its own authoritative canon and the obvious and prevailing spirit which pervades it, but by the practices, always imperfect and often grievously inconsistent, of its erring disciples. Few presume, will doubt that persecution for conscience sake—subjecting men and women to imprisonment, cruel torture and death in the name of Christ—is as gross an outrage upon the spirit of the gospel as can well be imagined. There are not many who will hesitate to acknowledge, that if ever there was a calling wholly inconsistent with Christianity, if ever there was a calling in itself inherently and irredeemably wicked, it was that of the man engaged in the African slave-trade a hundred years ago.
