Missouri question was pending, “The northern delegation is in the market; give me money enough, and I can buy them,” they both meant just what they said.  When the temperance publications tell us that candidates for office buy men with whiskey; and the oracles of street tattle, that the court, district attorney, and jury, in the late trial of Robinson were bought, we have no floating visions of “chattels personal,” man auctions, or coffles.

[Footnote A:  The following statute is now in force in the state of Illinois—­“No negro, mulatto, or Indian, shall at any time purchase any servant other than of their own complexion:  and if any of the persons aforesaid shall presume to purchase a white servant, such servant shall immediately become free, and shall be so held, deemed, and taken.”]

The transaction between Joseph and the Egyptians gives a clue to the meaning attached to “buy” and “bought with money.”  See Gen. xlvii. 18-26.  The Egyptians proposed to Joseph to become servants, and that he should buy them.  When the bargain was closed, Joseph said, “Behold I have bought you this day,” and yet it is plain that neither of the parties dreamed that the persons bought were in any sense articles of property, but merely that they became thereby obligated to labor for the government on certain conditions, as a compensation for the entire support of themselves and families during the famine.  And that the idea attached to “buy us,” and “behold I have bought you,” was merely the procuring of services voluntarily offered, and secured by contract, as a return for value received, and not at all that the Egyptians were bereft of their personal ownership, and made articles of property.  And this buying of services (they were to give one-fifth part of their crops to Pharaoh) is called in Scripture usage, buying the persons.  This case deserves special notice, as it is the only one where the whole transaction of buying servants is detailed—­the preliminaries, the process, the mutual acquiescence, and the permanent relation resulting therefrom.  In all other instances, the mere fact is stated without entering into particulars.  In this case, the whole process is laid open.

1.  The persons “bought,” sold themselves, and of their own accord.

2.  Obtaining permanently the services of persons, or even a portion of them, is called “buying” those persons.  The objector, at the outset, assumes that servants were bought of third persons; and thence infers that they were articles of property.  This is sheer assumption.  Not a single instance is recorded, of a servant being sold by any one but himself; not a case, either under the patriarchal, or the Mosaic systems, in which a master sold his servant.  That the servants who were “bought” sold themselves, is a fair inference from various passages of Scripture.