Page:A Chapter on Slavery.djvu/26

 strike them forcibly: the public conscience, enlightened from above, could not endure this wrong, and they would meet together and resolve, with one heart and one voice, to put an end to it. And, in that State or Nation, slavery would cease. And thus would the ball of light and heavenly ﬁre roll on from nation to nation, dissipating the dark stains of slavery as it went, till at length the whole earth would be purified; and then would this orb of ours go glittering on its way through the heavens, worthy to be looked upon by angels’ eyes.

This effect the All-Wise Savior foresaw when he announced that law of love: "A new commandment give I unto you, — that ye love one another." And this result, though not yet complete, is, nevertheless, in great part accomplished. Most of Europe is now enfranchised. Greece, which, at the time our Lord was upon earth, was full of slaves, has now not one. Rome, whose "slave-markets," as shown in the testimony before adduced, "were ﬁlled with men of every complexion and every clime," has no slave-market now. Other forms of oppression, indeed, yet exist there; but that of domestic servitude, at least, is wanting. Most of the other nations of Europe — Northern Italy, France, Germany, England, which during the middle ages, all contained hordes of bondmen — are now delivered from this evil and purged from this stain. And this is all the direct result of the inﬂuence of Christianity, working quietly but deeply in the heart of society; accomplishing its great purposes without' violence or noise or rude attack; acting, not as the storm but as the sunshine, — melting the frosty bonds