Slavery and the ConstitutionBowditch, William I. (William Ingersoll)
Religion
Slavery and the Constitution
Bowditch, William I. (William Ingersoll)
Enslaved persons -- United States -- Social conditions; Slavery -- United States
"3. _You are to be faithful and honest to your masters and
mistresses, not purloining or wasting their goods or substance, but
showing all good fidelity in all things...._ Do not your masters,
under God, provide for you? And how shall they be able to do this,
to feed and to clothe you, unless you take honest care of every
thing that belongs to them? _Remember that God requires this of you;
and, if you are not afraid of suffering for it here, you cannot
escape the vengeance of Almighty God, who will judge between you and
your masters, and make you pay severely in the next world for all
the injustice you do them here._ And though you could manage so
cunningly as to escape the eyes and hands of man, yet think what a
dreadful thing it is to fall into the hands of the living God, who
is able to cast both soul and body into hell!
"4. _You are to serve your masters with cheerfulness, reverence, and
humility. You are to do your masters' service with good-will, doing
it as the will of God from the heart, without any sauciness or
answering again._ How many of you do things quite otherwise, and,
instead of going about your work with a good will and a good heart,
dispute and grumble, give saucy answers, and behave in a surly
manner! There is something so becoming and engaging in a modest,
cheerful, good-natured behavior, that a little work done in that
manner seems better done and gives far more satisfaction than a
great deal more that must be done with fretting, vexation, and the
lash always held over you. It also gains the good-will and love of
those you belong to, and makes your own life pass with more ease and
pleasure. Besides, you are to consider that this grumbling and
ill-will does not affect your masters and mistresses only. They have
ways and means in their hands of forcing you to do your work,
whether you are willing or not. _But your murmuring and grumbling is
against God, who hath placed you in that service, who will punish
you severely in the next world for despising his commands._"
If the slave who wastes his master's goods and substance will not be
able to escape the vengeance of Almighty God, what will become of the
master who impoverishes and darkens the mind of his brother-man? Who
commits the greater injustice,--the man who robs another of his mind, or
the man who robs another of his money?
Mr. Glennie is equally explicit in his teaching. His fourth Sermon is on
the text, Eph. vi. 7, "With good-will doing service, as to the Lord, and
not to men," pp. 21, 22:--
"In this part of the word of God, servants are taught with what mind
they ought to do their service. They are told to do what is required
of them 'with good-will;' and to do it, 'as to the Lord, and not to
men.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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