Extract from the Minutes of the Synod of Mississippi, at a Meeting held in the City of Jackson, Miss., in December, 1853. He wrote a There is one production from his pen which produced a strong sensation in various parts of the United States. When the abolition excitement arose in the North, he resolved, as many others ought to have done, to give the Sacred Scriptures a thorough searching, to ascertain the doctrines and duties there inculcated in relation to slavery. He determined to investigate the subject in the most candid manner, and to receive whatever was taught with the most fearless and implicit faith. The result surprised himself. He found that the teachings of Scripture were greatly at variance with the popular belief. He wished to communicate his discoveries to others. He wrote a sermon on the subject and preached it at Port Gibson. It gave great offence not only to the Church, but also to his brethren in the ministry, who seriously advised him to preach that sermon no more. In the mean time, the Presbytery of Chillicothe (in Ohio) assumed the lofty position of instructors of their brethren of the South on the subject of slavery, exhorting them to abandon it as a heinous sin. They addressed a letter to the Presbytery of Mississippi on the subject. This letter was received by Mr. Smylie as stated Clerk. reply, to be laid before the Presbytery for their adoption. He read this reply to one of his brethren before the meeting. As he had entered into the teachings of Scripture in relation to slavery, the reply was long; and many of his views differed from those of his brethren. On these two accounts he was told that his reply would not, in all probability, be adopted by the Presbytery. It was then agreed that the brother whom he had consulted should write another reply, in a different style and manner, and more concise, and that this should be offered if his was not adopted. The concise reply was adopted by the Presbytery, and the Chillicothe letter and the reply were published together in a religious newspaper at Cincinnati, and there was no further annoyance from the Presbytery of Chillicothe. Mr. Smylie then determined that he would publish his views in a pamphlet form. Such was the variation of his sentiments from those of his brethren, that all whom he consulted, with but one or two exceptions, attempted to dissuade him from this step. With that honest inflexibility of purpose and confidence in the correctness of his own conclusions which ever distinguished the man, he published his pamphlet. For a while he was covered with odium, and honored with a large amount of abuse from the abolitionists of the North, for teaching that the Bible did not forbid the holding of slaves, and that it was tolerated CONFIRMATORY TESTIMONY. 471 in the primitive Church. These doctrines are now received as true both North and South, and they constitute the basis of action of the most respectable religious bodies even in the North itself; so that Mr. Smylie has the high honor of giving the true exposition of the doctrines of the Bible in relation to slavery, in the commencement of the Abolition excitement, and of giving instruction to others far more learned and talented than himself. JACKSON, MI88., December 17th, 1853. (Signed) CONFIRMATORY TESTIMONY. J. H. VAN Court, Chairman. In Dr. Baird's "Southern Rights and Northern Duties," before referred to, we find incidental evidence confirmatory of the point that certain of the Southern clergy were earlier than Southern statesmen in announcing the new doctrines on slavery. John C. Calhoun has been deemed, along with Mr. McDuffie, named above, one of the earliest among Southern Statesmen to take extreme proslavery ground. But Dr. Baird places him in the rear of Mr. Smylie, in point of time. Speaking of the Anti-Slavery Society, he says: "This society was but three years old, when, in 1835, it acquired an illustrious ally in the business of slavery agitation in the person of Mr. Calhoun, who then, as he afterward avowed, began to act upon the policy which ruled his subsequent life." Mr. Smylie began the work somewhat earlier. Nor is it supposed that he was impelled by any agitation at that time at the North. Even Dr. Baird says that "in 1835,” “the antislavery party was an insignificant faction." And from that day forward it was but a small fraction of the people. We have heard Mr. Smylie, from his own lips, state what led him at first to examine the subject more fully, and finally to repudiate the views then universal at the South. We were a member of the Synod of Mississippi, and present, when the obituary concerning him was adopted; and from our personal knowledge, we know it was the common belief among all classes in the Church at the South, that . he and other clergymen, chiefly in the Presbyterian Church, were the first to take open and broad ground on that platform which maintains the extreme proslavery views,-that Slavery is a divine system, an ordinance of God, on a par with the parental and matrimonial relations,-views which, at length, in the demands which were made in their name, plunged the country into treason, rebellion, and war. It is, therefore, no slander upon the Southern Church and Southern Clergy to say that THEY LED THE WAY in the revolution in Southern opinion upon slavery. They claim to have done this; they deem it an honor; they glory in it; they will not divide the honor with politicians; but, as in regard to the rebellion, as we have shown elsewhere, they claim to have led both politicians and people. As a suitable reward for this noble work, they embalm the memory of those who took the lead in it, in solemn obituaries adopted in ecclesiastical bodies; and that these deeds may not perish from among men, they send these memorials for sacred deposit in the Archives of the Presbyterian Historical Society, that all men to the end of time may know wherefore they were thus highly honored! PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS. 473 CHAPTER XIII. SLAVERY IN POLEMICS.-DIVINE REVELATION. It seems almost to be a work of supererogation, at the present time, to argue for or against Slavery in the United States; to attempt to resolve questions with the pen which are in process of settlement by the sword, and which, before the ink we use is dry, may be determined forever. Our plan, however, would not be complete, unless we should give some attention to the reasonings by which the modern doctrines upon slavery are defended. We shall not endeavor to emulate either the eloquence or the argument of those men of Kentucky, some of them of a former day, whose writings upon slavery we have already given; nor do we think the occasion calls for any thing to be said, or indeed that any thing can be said, against the special character and influence of the system, beyond what they have uttered. Our argument will bear chiefly upon points brought to view in the literature of the rebellion, and will aim to combat the positions taken by its instigators and abettors. PRELIMINARY CONSIDERATIONS. We have given, at great length, in the chapter immediately preceding, the doctrines announced by those who defend negro slavery as it exists in the South. It will be seen that the two propositions, numerically designated, which we have there laid down, are covered in every particular, and even more than covered, by the authorities we have cited. It will be seen, moreover, that every position taken by these authorities, is made to illustrate, apply to, and justify the Southern system of negro slavery. This is the specific and sole purpose for which their works are written and their reasonings elaborated. We do not propose to exhaust the entire argument by which these extravagant positions may be met. That would require a volume instead of a chapter. So much has been written on this whole subject already, by able scholars, that it seems needless to waste many words upon it; and yet, it will scarcely do to say that at this time of day these extraordinary emanations are not worth noticing. From the sources indicated, and by the authority of great names, they are still spread before the religious public, with glowing commendation, while those who dissent from these high priests of the Southern Oracie are freely called by "religious" men "apostates," "infidels," "heretics," "French Jacobins," and the like. These authoritative responses have an influence upon many minds who draw their inspiration through the channels which convey them. They should be brought to the test of truth. We propose to notice only a few of the main points made, and to present our reasons for dissenting from them. THE SCRIPTURES GROSSLY LIBELLED. As incidental to the subsequent argument, we notice, in passing, the monstrous assumption of Dr. Robinson, editor of The True Presbyterian, that the servitude among the Jews, in the time of Abraham and Moses, is the essenti type of negro slavery in the Southern States, as the systems are judged by their respective "codes," and by the facts. He asserts this in terms, several times over; and yet, no greater libel upon the truth was ever put into human language. Let the reader first turn to the chapter where the paper |