[Footnote E:  Verse 8.]

10.  The apostle preferred a request instead of imposing a command, on the ground of CHARITY.[A] He would give Philemon an opportunity of discharging his obligations under the impulse of love.  To this impulse, he was confident Philemon would promptly and fully yield.  How could he do otherwise?  The thing itself was right.  The request respecting it came from a benefactor, to whom, under God, he was under the highest obligations.[B] That benefactor, now an old man and in the hands of persecutors, manifested a deep and tender interest in the matter, and had the strongest persuasion that Philemon was more ready to grant than himself to entreat.  The result, as he was soon to visit Colosse, and had commissioned Philemon to prepare a lodging for him, must come under the eye of the apostle.  The request was so manifestly reasonable and obligatory, that the apostle, after all, described a compliance with it, by the strong word “obedience."[C]

[Footnote A:  Verse 9 [Greek:  dia taen agapaen].]

[Footnote B:  Verse 19.]

[Footnote C:  Verse 21.]

Now how must all this have been understood by the church at Colosse?—­a church, doubtless, made up of such materials as the church at Corinth, that is, of members chiefly from the humblest walks of life.  Many of them had probably felt the degradation and tasted the bitterness of the servile condition.  Would they have been likely to interpret the apostle’s letter under the bias of feelings friendly to slavery!—­And put the slaveholder’s construction on its contents!  Would their past experience or present sufferings—­for doubtless some of them were still “under the yoke”—­have suggested to their thoughts such glosses as some of our theological professors venture to put upon the words of the apostle!  Far otherwise.  The Spirit of the Lord was there, and the epistle was read in the light of “liberty.”  It contained the principles of holy freedom, faithfully and affectionately applied.  This must have made it precious in the eyes of such men “of low degree” as were most of the believers, and welcome to a place in the sacred canon.  There let it remain as a luminous and powerful defense of the cause of emancipation!

But what with Prof.  Stuart?  “If any one doubts, let him take the case of Paul’s sending Onesimus back to Philemon, with an apology for his running away, and sending him back to be his servant for life."[A]

[Footnote A:  See his letter to Dr. Fisk, supra p. 8.]

“Paul sent back Onesimus to Philemon.”  By what process?  Did the apostle, a prisoner at Rome, seize upon the fugitive, and drag him before some heartless and perfidious “Judge,” for authority to send him back to Colosse?  Did he hurry his victim away from the presence of the fat and supple magistrate, to be driven under chains and the lash to the field of unrequited toil, whence he had escaped?  Had the apostle been like some teachers