Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Slavery volume 5 .djvu/134

122 He must go up to Andover, and get a minister to defend him, in the name of "conscience and the Constitution," supporting slavery out of the Old Testament and New Testament. "To what mean uses may we not descend!" There is a "short and easy method" with Professor Stuart, and all other men who defend slavery out of the Bible. If the Bible defends slavery, it is not so much the better for slavery, but so much the worse for the Bible. If Mr Stuart and Mr Webster do not see that, there are plenty of obscurer men that do. Of all the attacks ever made on the Bible, by "deists" and "infidels," none would do so much to bring it into disrepute, as to show that it sanctioned American slavery.

It is rather a remarkable fact, that an orthodox minister should be on Mr Webster's paper, endorsing for the Christianity of slavery. Let me say a word respecting the position of the Representative from Boston. I speak only of his position, not of his personal character. Let him, and all men, have the benefit of the distinction between their personal character and official conduct. Mr Winthrop is a consistent Whig; a representative of the idea of the Whig party North, protection and slavery. When he first went into Congress, it was distinctly understood that he was not going to meddle with the matter of slavery; the tariff was the thing. All this was consistent. It is to be supposed that a Northern Whig will put the mills of the North before the black men of the South: and "Property before persons," might safely be writ on the banner of the Whig party, North or South. Mr Winthrop seems a little uneasy in his position. Some time ago he complained of a "nest of vipers" in Boston, who had broken their own teeth in gnawing a file; meaning the "vipers" in the free soil party, I suppose, whose teeth, however, have a little edge still left on them. He finds it necessary to define his position, and show that he has kept up his communication with the base line of operations from which he started. This circumstance is a little suspicious.

Unlike Mr Webster, Mr Winthrop seems to think religion is a good thing in politics, for in his speech of May