Sir, look at its plain import, and see the relation which it establishes. The slave is held simply _for the use of his master_, to whose behests his life, liberty, and happiness are devoted, and by whom he may be bartered, leased, mortgaged, bequeathed, invoiced, shipped as cargo, stored as goods, sold on execution, knocked off at public auction, and even staked at the gaming-table on the hazard of a card or a die,--all according to law. Nor is there anything, within the limit of life, inflicted on a beast, which may not be inflicted on the slave. He may be marked like a hog, branded like a mule, yoked like an ox, hobbled like a horse, driven like an ass, sheared like a sheep, maimed like a cur, and constantly beaten like a brute,--all according to law. And should life itself be taken, what is the remedy? The Law of Slavery, imitating that rule of evidence which in barbarous days and barbarous countries prevented the Christian from testifying against the Mahometan, openly pronounces the incompetency of the whole African race, whether bond or free, to testify against a white man in any case, and thus, after surrendering the slave to all possible outrage, crowns its tyranny by excluding the very testimony through which the bloody cruelty of the Slave-Master might be exposed. Thus in its Law does Slavery paint itself; but it is only when we look at details, and detect its essential elements, _five in number_, all inspired by _a single motive_, that its character becomes completely manifest. _Foremost_, of course, in these elements, is the impossible pretension, where Barbarism is lost in impiety, by which man claims _property in man_. Against such blasphemy the argument is brief. According to the Law of Nature, written by the same hand that placed the planets in their orbits, and, like them, constituting part of the eternal system of the Universe, every human being has complete title to himself direct from the Almighty. Naked he is born; but this birthright is inseparable from the human form. A man may be poor in this world’s goods; but he owns himself. No war or robbery, ancient or recent,--no capture--no middle passage,--no change of clime,--no purchase-money,--no transmission from hand to hand, no matter how many times, and no matter at what price, can defeat this indefeasible, God-given franchise. And a divine mandate, strong as that which guards Life, guards Liberty also. Even at the very morning of Creation, when God said, “Let there be Light,”--earlier than the malediction against murder,--he set the everlasting difference between man and chattel, giving to man “dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.” “That right we hold By his donation; but man over men He made not lord: such title to himself Reserving, human left from human free.”[39]