Page:Ecclesiastical Relation of Negroes.djvu/12

12 privileges of church office and rule, are common to all believers, irrespective of caste, class, or condition. I shall show, Sir, beyond all cavil, that there is a vast, and an unbridged chasm between this premise and this conclusion. The argument is, that because the blessings of redemption are common to all classes and races of true believers, therefore it follows, of course, that every privilege and grade of church power must be made common to them. But the answer is, that several Bible instances themselves show that this consequence does not follow. None here will dispute that the Old Testament church had a gospel; nor will any deny that its saving blessings were common to all believing Hebrews, though not to all Gentiles. But lo! the priesthood, the clerical function of the day, was expressly limited to the tribe of Levi! In Galatians 3:28, (a passage parallel to the one quoted against me,) St. Paul says: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free; there is neither male nor female; for ye are all one in Christ Jesus." Blessed doctrine! Yet the same apostle says, "I suffer not a woman to teach;" thus excluding from official privilege, on grounds of class, one half of the the whole Christian world, which he had just declared to be "all one in Christ Jesus." So you see, gentlemen, that the apostle Paul evidently did not believe in your argument. Miss Antoinette Brown and Mrs. Abby Kelly were precisely with you; but the Apostle was not. Again, the Apostle, in the Epistles to Timothy and Titus, rules that no convert who was implicated, before his conversion, in polygamy, must be ordained a presbyter. For so the best expositors view 1 Tim. 3:2, and Titus 1:6. Here is another exclusion on grounds of class. Surely no one will argue that these husbands of more than one wife were excluded because they had been sinners. Had not the Apostle himself been a murderer? Or on the grounds that they were still living in sin; for this would also have excluded them from the Church. It is an exclusion on grounds of class, and independent of the question of their faith and repentance. Thus we have three instances, confirmed by inspiration itself, showing that the supposed consequence does not hold, and that it is not true that all distinctions of class are abolished as to church office, because they are abolished as to church membership.

But here our opponents resort to an evasion, drawn from the very fact that these instances are confirmed by revelation. They plead: The limitation is right, we admit, in these three cases, because God made it himself. But man has no right to make any other limitation at all.

Again, I answer, no; you shall not change your ground. Your argument just now was that an entire community in church office followed from the admitted community in church membership, by the very nature of the case. But I showed you that this did not follow, because God has decided the contrary, in three cases; and he can not do wrong.—I claim therefore, that the argument is mine. I have manifestly taken away your position; I have removed from under you the very ground on which you yourselves placed your conclusion. It is vain to seek another: the case is mine.

I answer, second, that, even if it were allowable for you to change your ground, your new ground is not true. It is not true that the Church has no right to place such limitations upon the common claim