Page:A Complete System of Christian Theology (Wakefield, 1869, completesystemof0000wake).pdf/670



—The following statements by Mr. Watson furnish the grounds on which English Methodism stands in regard to slavery:

The Methodist Episcopal Church in the United States has long included the buying and selling of human beings among the sins sufficient to exclude the offender from the kingdom of God. It also declared in 1784 of "the practice of holding our fellow-creatures in slavery;" "we view it as contrary to the golden law of God, on which hang all the law and the prophets, and the unallenable rights of mankind." Having so declared, the Discipline has reiterated from the 1796 that we are "more than ever," or "as much as ever convinced of the great evil of slavery;" so that in principle the declaration of 1784 has been constantly reaffirmed. From 1796 the question, "What shall be done for the 'extirpation' of slavery?" has been retained, so that such "extirpation" has been unchangeably held as one of the object for which we exist as a Church.—