The answer is that Christ in the deepest way did condemn slavery, and that the apostles in the realest way did begin their crusade. They gathered no visible army, and they enforced no written statute, but Christ stated and his followers promulgated a conception of humanity that prophesied the melting of all chains. Usually the claim is that the Golden Rule was the primary foe of slavery, but the Golden Rule is of little force, apart from that doctrine of human personality that pervades the New Testament. Give that doctrine power, and it would refuse to live in the same world with slavery. That doctrine, under a Captain, was a delivering army. That doctrine, under a King, was an Emancipation Proclamation. The Golden Rule had been given in negative form by Confucius, and it went to sleep in his maxims. That rule had been uttered negatively by Plato, but it nestled quietly in his poetry. Hillel approached the positive statement of the rule, but he does not get credit for being its author. The glory of a truth lies with the one who gives it power. Jesus made the Golden Rule leap to its feet. He turned it into a most effective traveler. It praised God on its wide journeys. It began to work wonders. That work was slow, but it was both sure and thorough. The Rule had power behind its saying. At length the Spirit carried that gracious weapon over the seas and laid it in the hearts of Clarkson and Wilberforce. Soon the English flag floated over freemen everywhere. Again the Spirit carried the doctrine over other seas and lodged it in the hearts of Lovejoy, Phillips, and Garrison. Directly four million sable faces were glowing with the light of liberty. Jesus had said, "If the Son therefore shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed." The word had essentially a spiritual meaning, but it was worked out, also, in a splendid literalness. The Son made men free, not primarily by the force of law, nor yet primarily by the violence of armies, but rather by the conquest of disposition. The honor of the victory is with the Bible theory of humanity, made strong with the power of Christ.