Slavery. By William E. Channing [pp. 268-306]

Slavery.
various, it is impossible that the same form should be equally
conducive to happiness and virtue under all circumstances.
No one form, therefore, is prescribed in the bible, or is universally obligatory. The question which form is, under given
circumstances, to be adopted, is one of great practical difficulty,
and must be left to the decision of those who have the power
to decide, on their own responsibility. The question, however, does not depend upon the degree in which these several
forms may encroach on the natural rights of men. In the
patriarchal age, the most natural, the most feasible, and perhaps the most beneficial form of government was by the head
of the family. His power by the law of nature, and the necessity of the case, extended without any other limit than the
general principles of morals, over his children, and in the absenceof other regular authority, would not terminate when the
children arrived at a particular age, but be continued during
life. He was the natural umpire between his adult offspring,
he was their lawgiver and leader. His authority would
naturally extend over his more remote descendants, as they
continued to increase, and on his death, might devolve on
the next oldest of the family. There is surely nothing in this
mode of constituting society whicl's necessarily immoral. If
found to be conducive to the general good, it might be indefinitely continued. It would not suffice to render its abrogation obligatory, to say that all men are born free and equal;
that the youth of twenty-one had as good a right to have a
voice in the affairs of the family as the aged patriarch; that
the right of self-government is indefeasible, &c. Unless it
could be shown that the great end of society was not
attainable by this mode of-organization, and that it would be
more securely promoted by some other, it would be an immorality to require or to effect the change. And if a change
became, in the course of time, obviously desirable. its nature
and extent would be questions to be determined by the peculiar circumstances of the case, and not by the rule of abstract
rights. Under some circumstances it might be requisite to
confine the legislative power to a single individual; under
others to the hands of a few; and under others to commit it
to the whole community. It would be absurd to maintain,
on the ground of the natural equality of men, that a horde
of ignorant and vicious savages, should be organized as a pure
democracy, if experience taught that such a form of government was destructive to themselves and others. These different modes of constituting civil society ore not necessarily
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