With respect to matrimonial rights nothing can be more misleading than the self-gratulations of writers who have treated colonial history from what Charles Francis Adams has aptly called the "filio-pietistic" point of view.[675] Thus in his early edition Bancroft, referring to the alleged mitigating character of Massachusetts legislation, securing to the slave such protection "as the Hebrew scriptures seemed to enjoin," declares that "this brought about a total modification of the character of negro slavery by giving to the slave the rights of marriage and the family."[676] Palfrey goes even farther in his zeal, solemnly assuring us that "from the reverence entertained by the Fathers of New England for the nuptial tie, it is safe to infer that slave husbands and wives were never parted."[677] In like spirit statesmen, jurists, and historians have reiterated the assertion that slavery was not hereditary in Massachusetts. "In all her annals," says Charles Sumner, "no person was ever born a slave" on her soil; and if, in fact, "the issue of slaves was sometimes held in bondage, it was never by sanction of any statute or law of Colony or Commonwealth."[678] Similar statements are made by Hurd, Washburn, and Belknap.[679] Justice Gray declares that "previously to the adoption of the State Constitution in 1780 negro slavery existed to some extent, and negroes held as slaves might be sold, but all children of slaves were by law free."[680] The unsupported dictum of Palfrey is equally confident. "In fact," he says, "no person was ever born in legal slavery in Massachusetts."[681] [Footnote 675: See his admirable _Massachusetts: Its History and Historians_ (Boston, 1893).] [Footnote 676: Compare MOORE'S article "Slave Marriages in Mass.," in DAWSON'S _Hist. Mag._, 2d series, V (Feb., 1869), 135, to which I am much indebted.] [Footnote 677: PALFREY, _Hist. of New England_, II, 30, note; _cf._ MOORE, _loc. cit._, 135-37.] [Footnote 678: SUMNER, in his speech in the Senate, June 28, 1854: _Works_, III, 384.] [Footnote 679: According to HURD, _Law of Freedom and Bondage_, I, 225, "the involuntary servitude of Indians and negroes in the several colonies originated under a law not promulgated by legislation, and rested upon the prevalent views of universal jurisprudence, or of the _law of nations_, supported by the express or implied authority of the home Government." Compare WASHBURN, "The Extinction of Slavery in Mass.," 4 _Mass. Hist. Coll._ (1857), IV, 333-46; the same in _Procds. Mass. Hist. Soc._ (1855-58), 188 ff.; and BELKNAP'S answer to TUCKER'S _Queries_ (1795), in 1 _Mass. Hist. Coll._, IV, 191-211, which on the points under consideration is very superficial and misleading.]