Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 | Page 8

fiction. Nay, one of the most affecting illustrations of pure and
undefiled Christianity that ever proceeded from an uninspired pen, was
gravely declared, by an organ of cotton divinity, to be an
ANTI-CHRISTIAN book.[5] Truly, indeed, the wisdom of man is
foolishness with God. "He disappointeth the devices of the crafty."
Branded with falsehood and impiety, the author was happily put on her
trial before the civilized world. She collected, arranged, and gave to the
press, a mass of unimpeachable documents, consisting of laws, judicial
decisions, trials, confessions of slaveholders, advertisements from
southern papers, and testimonies of eye-witnesses. The proof was
conclusive and overwhelming that the picture she had drawn of
American slavery was unfaithful, only because the coloring was faint,
and wanted the crimson dye of the original. A verdict of not guilty of
exaggeration has been rendered by acclamation.
It has long been the standing refuge of the slaveholders, that northern
men and Europeans, in condemning slavery, were passing judgment
against an institution of which they were ignorant. The "peculiar
institution" was represented as some great mystery which could not be
understood beyond the slave region. Thanks to the fugitive law, it has
led to the construction of a "key," which has unlocked our Republican
bastile, thrown open to the sunlight its hideous dungeons, and exposed
the various instruments of torture for subjecting the soul, as well as the
body, to hopeless and unresisting bondage. The iniquity of our
cherished institution is no longer a MYSTERY. All Christendom is
now made familiar with it, and is sending forth a cry of indignant

remonstrance and of taunting scorn. Such is the suppression of
anti-slavery agitation given to the slaveholders by their northern
friends--such the strength imparted by the fugitive slave law to the
system of human bondage. How applicable to the inventors and
supporters of that statute are the words of David, in regard to some
politician of his own day: "Behold he travaileth with iniquity, and hath
conceived mischief, and brought forth falsehood. He made a pit, and
digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made. His mischief shall
return upon his own head, and his violent dealing shall come down
upon his own pate;" and then he adds, "I will praise the Lord." So also
let the Christian bless and magnify HIM, who by his infinite wisdom
brings good out of evil, and in the case of the fugitive law, HATH
CAUSED THE WRATH OF MAN TO PRAISE HIM.
But there is still a remainder of wrath. The law is still on the Statute
Book, and hungry politicians are promising that there it shall ever
remain; and terrible threats come from the south, of the ruin that shall
overwhelm the free States, should the law be repealed or rendered less
abominable than at present. Yet, in spite of northern promises, and
professions of security, and in spite of the great swelling words of the
dealers in human flesh, the practical, like the moral working of the law,
has been very far from what its authors anticipated. The law was passed
the 18th September, 1850, and, in two years and nine months, not fifty
slaves have been recovered under it--not an average of EIGHTEEN
slaves a year! Poor compensation this to the slaveholders for making
themselves a bye-word, a proverb, and a reproach to Christendom--for
giving a new and mighty impulse to abolition, and for deepening the
detestation felt by the true friends of liberty and humanity, for an
institution asking and obtaining for its protection a law so repugnant to
the moral sense of mankind. But while this artful and wicked law, with
its army of ten-dollar judges, and marshals, and constables, and
office-seekers, and politicians, with the President and his cabinet all
striving to enforce it, "to the fullest extent," has restored to their
masters not eighteen slaves a year; the escapes from the prison house
have probably never been more numerous, nor the aid and sympathy
afforded by Christians more abundant. Thus has THE REMAINDER
OF WRATH BEEN RESTRAINED. In the marvellous conversion of

this odious law into an anti-slavery agency, let us find a new motive for
unceasing and unwearied agitation against slavery, and a new pledge of
ultimate triumph.
[Illustration: (signature) William Jay]
BEDFORD, June 1853.
FOOTNOTES:
[4] A late American traveller, in Germany, invited to an evening party
at the house of a Professor, attempted to compliment the company by
expressing his indignation at the oppression which "the dear old
German fatherland" suffered at the hands of its rulers. The American's
profferred sympathy was coldly received. "We admit," was the reply,
"that there is much wrong here, but we do not admit the right of your
country to rebuke it. There is a system now with you, worse than any
thing