and should say respecting it — Oh, it is too far back in time to be allowed any influence now-a-days, as it is but a saying of "dim antiquity" and cannot, therefore, apply to these times of facts, superior knowledge and light! And were we to apply this method of comment to the ten commandments of the decalogue, which are of the same date with the grant of Moses (Levit. xxv) to the Hebrews, to buy and enslave the negroes of Canaan, and should insinuate that they, too, are but some words spoken two or three thousand years ago, and on that account had lost their obligatory force, we should be ranked with those who can abuse and pervert the Scriptures to suit the times and purposes of wicked and foolish men.
Yes, so hardened, bold and impudent have many of the members of that fearful combination, the abolition society grown, that they disallow that the Holy Ghost inspired Noah at all, at the time he pronounced the doom of slavery upon the race of Ham, because they say it is preposterous to believe that God would commune with such a man as Noah, when he had but just awaked from a sleep of drunken inebriation. But the reader will remember our vindication of Noah's character on that occasion, in a former page, and should never forget, that, notwithstanding this slander of abolitionists upon that holy man, for whose righteousness the ark was commanded to be built, and mankind preserved in it, the Almighty has seen fit to fulfill and carry out, in facts, every iota of that decree as then announced, not only as it relates to Ham and his people but also to Shem and Japheth.
To discourage a belief in the minds of the people
