Slavery and the War
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hardened. His counselors and mighty men strengthened themselves
against God and endeavored to explain the plagues as the result of
natural causes. Each visitation from God was more severe than the
preceding one, yet they would not release the children of Israel until
the angel of the Lord slew the first-born of the Egyptians. From the
king upon the throne down to the most humble and lowly, there was
wailing and mourning. Then Pharaoh commanded to let Israel go; but
after the Egyptians had buried their dead, he repented that he had let
Israel go. His counselors and mighty men tried to account for their
bereavement. They would not admit that the visitation or judgment
was from God, and therefore they pursued after the children of Israel.
When the Israelites beheld the Egyptian host in pursuit, some upon
horses and some in chariots, and equipped for war, their hearts failed
them. The Red Sea was before, the Egyptian host behind. They could
see no way of escape. A shout of triumph burst from the Egyptians
to find Israel completely in their power. The Israelites were greatly
terrified. But the Lord commanded Moses to bid them go forward, and
to lift up the rod and stretch out his hand over the sea and divide it. He
did so, and lo, the sea parted, and the children of Israel passed over
dry shod. Pharaoh had so long withstood God, and hardened his heart
against His mighty, wondrous works, that he in blindness rushed into
the path which God had miraculously prepared for His people. Again
Moses was commanded to stretch forth his hand over the sea, “and the
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sea returned to his strength,” and the waters covered the Egyptian host,
and they were drowned.
This scene was presented before me to illustrate the selfish love of
slavery, and the desperate measures which the South would adopt to
cherish the institution, and the dreadful lengths to which they would
go before they would yield. The system of slavery has reduced and
degraded human beings to the level of the brutes, and the majority of
slave masters regard them as such. The consciences of these masters
have become seared and hardened, as was Pharaoh’s; and if compelled
to release their slaves, their principles remain unchanged, and they
would make the slave feel their oppressive power if possible. It looked
to me like an impossibility now for slavery to be done away. God
alone can wrench the slave from the hand of his desperate, relentless
oppressor. All the abuse and cruelty exercised toward the slave is