Slavery tyrannically assumes power which Heaven denied,--while, under its barbarous necromancy, borrowed from the Source of Evil, a man is changed into a chattel, a person is withered into a thing, a soul is shrunk into merchandise. Say, Sir, in lofty madness, that you own the sun, the stars, the moon; but do not say that you own a man, endowed with soul to live immortal, when sun and moon and stars have passed away. _Secondly._ Slavery paints itself again in its complete _abrogation of marriage_, recognized as a sacrament by the Church, and as a contract by the civil power, wherever civilization prevails. Under the Law of Slavery no such sacrament is respected, and no such contract can exist. The ties formed between slaves are all subject to the selfish interests or more selfish lust of the master, whose license knows no check. Natural affections which have come together are rudely torn asunder: nor is this all. Stripped of every defence, the chastity of a whole race is exposed to violence, while the result is recorded in tell-tale faces of children, glowing with a master’s blood, but doomed for their mother’s skin to Slavery through descending generations. The Senator from Mississippi [Mr. BROWN], galled by the comparison between Slavery and Polygamy, winces. I hail this sensibility as the sign of virtue. Let him reflect, and he will confess that there are many disgusting elements in Slavery, not present in Polygamy, while the single disgusting element of Polygamy is more than present in Slavery. By license of Polygamy, one man may have many wives, all bound to him by marriage-tie, and in other respects protected by law. By license of Slavery, a whole race is delivered over to prostitution and concubinage, without the protection of any law. Surely, Sir, is not Slavery barbarous? _Thirdly._ Slavery paints itself again in its complete _abrogation of the parental relation_, provided by God in his benevolence for the nurture and education of the human family, and constituting an essential part of Civilization itself. And yet by the Law of Slavery--happily beginning to be modified in some places--this relation is set at nought, and in its place is substituted the arbitrary control of the master, at whose mere command little children, such as the Saviour called unto him, though clasped by a mother’s arms, are swept under the hammer of the auctioneer. I do not dwell on this exhibition. Sir, is not Slavery barbarous?