I have said that God, alone, was competent to decide what was best under the circumstances for masters and servants, individuals and nations. I have clearly shown in the following chapters, that as masters and servants, and as a nation we cannot do better, than to faithfully observe and carry out the injunctions of Holy Writ--that the best interests of all concerned will be subserved thereby--that there is no other safe and practicable course--that the Bible, and the Bible alone, is a safe and sure guide in this emergency. We "may bite and devour each other;" speculate, wrangle and contend to no purpose. No good will ever grow out of it. I have shown that nothing is likely to mitigate the evils of slavery--or rather, its abuses; or in any reasonable time bring about its abolition, but a rigid adherence on the part of masters and servants, to the duties and obligations imposed on them in the Sacred Volume. That it is the duty of servants to love, serve and obey their masters, and that it is the duty of masters to enlighten the minds and elevate the characters of their slaves--to prepare them for self government and the enjoyment of liberty, and then to colonize them.
And I flatter myself, that I have clearly and indisputably demonstrated, that the African race in this country, are not yet prepared for freedom--and that they cannot enjoy freedom in our midst, provided they were prepared for it--and consequently that the African derives no benefit from emancipation if he remain among us. Hence, the propriety of manumitting slaves is, to say the least, doubtful, unless they are colonized. Every man of truth and candor, who is acquainted with the condition of slaves and free negroes, North and South, must admit, that the conditions of slaves is better, than that of free negroes.
Mrs. Stowe has labored hard to prove that there are evils and abuses in the treatment of slaves in the Southern States; but then she would have us substitute greater evils for lesser--according to the old proverb, "out of the frying pan into the fire." Many of the Southern people as deeply deplore these evils, and are as fully impressed with the necessity of removing them, as Mrs. Stowe or any one else; but hitherto they have been unable to decide upon any plan by which these evils could be removed--except, at least, to a very limited extent. They knew well, that if they manumitted their slaves, it would involve both the slaves and themselves in greater evils than African slavery itself, as it exists in the Southern States.