Christianity and slavery: a review of the correspondence between Richard Fuller, D.D. of Beaufort, South Carolina, and Francis Wayland, D.D. of ... considered as a scriptural institution [Paperback]

William Hague (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 1, 1847

This volume is produced from digital images from the Cornell University Library Samuel J. May Anti-Slavery Collection

Product Details

• Paperback: 58 pages
• Publisher: Cornell University Library (January 1, 1847)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1429711574
• ISBN-13: 978-1429711579
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 0.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,633,042 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A powerful polemic of religion and slavery, July 15, 2008

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Barrie W. Bracken "Researcher" (Daytona Beach, FL) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Christianity and slavery: a review of the correspondence between Richard Fuller, D.D. of Beaufort, South Carolina, and Francis Wayland, D.D. of ... considered as a scriptural institution (Paperback)

This little booklet is to be a review of the correspondence between Richard Fuller a wealthy South Carolina planter who became a powerful Maryland preacher and a Rhode Island preacher Dr. Francis Wayland who engaged in correspondence on the issue of scriptural basis of slavery. This book of correspondence is available at the price of about $100 if anyone is interested, but our review of the correspondence is not really necessary to the appreciation of this book. Geographically it would seem that Dr. Wayland and Dr. Fuller should be on totally opposite sides of the question. It is worthwhile to note thatDr. Wayland was a student of Moses Stuart. Reverend Hague points out there is not much difference between them. "Eloquent as is Dr. Fuller's argument and appeal, further bad as he is the religious spirit which he breathes, earnest though he is as a creature of bargain to the center, yet, by advocating such a doctrine of slavery as an element of Christianity, he has done greater disservice to the cause of religion and humanity, and could possibly be achieved by all the traffickers of human flesh at whom the law of Christian nations now condemn as pirates.(see page 7).the author believes Dr. Wayland in taking a very soft view of slavery grants a great deal too much to Dr. Fuller. Reverend Hague points out what ever the Roman law was it does not affect the Christian community because their law was the law of Christ. The apostles had been cited as supporting slavery because there is no open condemnation of that in their epistles. "Now in reading what is written to societies so constituted [the congregations in the Roman Empire], it is a great error to infer that the apostles either sanctioned or tolerated any relation between man and man as established by Roman law, because we do not find in their epistles a particular denunciation of it.[p.32]"

The author offers as illustration of the New Testament's condemnation of slavery that very familiar epistle of Paul to Philemon. "According to the law of Rome, Onesimus was still the property of Philemon, who, as a citizen, had a legal claim upon his services; but the letter does not intimate the slightest probability that Philemon, the Christian, would or could urge that claim [see page 43]." the book ends with a parable. We are referred to the time when a great number of white persons were held as slaves in Algiers. "What if, on demanding the release of these captives, their lords should meet us for such Christian arguments as are found in the letters of Dr. Fuller, should declare to us that they had not any thing to do with bringing these poor people there, but they have found themselves in the relation of ownership to them, it just had now become a permanent element of their social organization, if slavery had been tolerated by our old holy religion in the Roman Empire, and that they now appeal to us, by our regard to order, to justice, to civil claims of property which time had consecrated, and especially by a reference for the primitive and prudent teachings of that Christianity which we so much gloried, in which we show ourselves to be lovers of peace, and leave them undisturbed, in the enjoyment of those rights which divine Providence has so long invest in them? Would our friends in South Carolina then be found in yielding quietly to the power of these ` sacred truths,' and paying homage to the intellect of the Christian teacher who headed, by means of them, so wonderfully enlightened the minds of the Algerians? [See pages 47-48]"

The logic of this book is more compelling than many others dealing with the same subject. As a preacher William Hague takes an honest look at the condition of religion in his time and pleads in his last sentence that his readers, "thus, battling against one another sin, they keep it from concealing his native vileness land roving itself in the authority of religion, and proudly wearing the sanctions of Christ, like stars in its crown of triumph."