Preached by Rev. Henry Ward Beecher at Plymouth Church
Brooklyn, NY - January 4, 1863
The term Babylon, borrowed from a real city, is employed often figuratively. And without straining a point at all, it may be said that it is the kingdom of despotism, the kingdom of oppression, on earth, that is meant by the term Babylon. It is more specific than the term kingdom of darkness; for it seems to refer to a speciality of despotism. The violation of the eternal principles of justice for the injury and destruction of men, - this seems to be that which is grouped and included under that term Babylon. Nay, it is even more full and specific than that. It is the violation of human rights by the despotic selfishness of commerce that is included in and intended by the term Babylon.
A great community, banded, fed, prospered, and made rich, through commerce, by unlawful means, involving the waste and the destruction of the rights, the purity, and the lives of the poor and of the needy, — such a community is a Babylon. If you ask, then, “What is this Babylon ?” It is the symbol of injustice and oppression practiced by the commerce of the world.
If you ask, further, “Where is Babylon?” I reply, “In no one place, in no one age; but in every age, and in every land where the energies and industries of nations are aroused to increase wealth regardless of the welfare of mankind, - there is Babylon.” “The kingdom of God, — where is that?” In no one place; for the kingdom of God is a term that signifies the movement of a moral force. And wherever there is progressive goodness, wherever there is rectitude and justice, there is the kingdom of God.
Babylon is the modern dynasty of the Devil.
Babylon’s Globalization
Let's take a look at Africa. Little has yet been accomplished; and we may say that darkness still dwells where for ages darkness has not been illuminated. Africa and its countless millions may be said to be yet buried in a midnight for which there seems to be no preparation of morning. But a morning shall come, though its star has not yet dawned. God, that holds the stars in his right hand, will in his own time roll them above the horizon; and there shall be a bright and morning star for Africa.
India and China have been hijacked by the commerce of Europe, and chiefly of Great Britain. For more than a hundred and fifty years, the commerce of England has fed on the people of Asia. England has fed on the spoils of commercial oppression. And of all the nations of time, of all the kingdoms on the earth, there is not one that stands so centrally as the very Babylon of Babylons, made rich and strong by grinding people and eating them up, as England.
In looking upon our own country, the United States of America, the external appearance of the current state of affairs is sad. It is very sad. Civil war is always a spectacle of sadness. The conflict of brethren, the horrible loss of life, the accompanying sufferings that hover about the movements of armies, and that belong to war campaigns. If you look upon these outward things, you shall mourn and say, “ It is a time of darkness. Of thick darkness. When there is no light even upon the mountains.” But, if you look at the condition of the country, not externally, it is noble.
Democracy’s Liberty VS. Aristocracy’s Oppression
There is a conflict going on now with the government of this continent between two giant forces; the spirit of Christian liberty and democracy, and the spirit of aristocratic oppression. This event brings a spectacle before God and angels and faith-seeing men. It is this spectacle, which is the last great battle of the Lord God Almighty on this continent between these two great forces.
There are two great facts in this world, and there are but two. All other facts beside these are as dust. They are, first, the autocrat of Russia, standing in the far Eastern hemisphere, and against his nobles, employing the whole military resources and wealth of that great empire for the enfranchisement of his serfs; and second, the President of this Western republic, standing in the midst of war and darkness, and sending forth the light of that Emancipation Proclamation by which he declares the liberty of three millions of slaves on this continent. These two events are like two mountains of Calvary lifted up. All the rest that is doing in the world is low and dim in comparison.
 |
| Emancipation of the Serfs in Russia, 1861 |
You are not fit to be free, nor to be the conservationists of the freedom of other people, until the time comes when you can say, in the fullness of your heart, in respect to every person on the globe, black or white, that liberty is their right! Not our benefit, not our advantage, but their right! And, although the occasion of giving people back their natural rights is a military necessity, it is nonetheless a glorious triumph. Through that we recognize the divine truth of the natural right of every person to their own life, their own liberty, and to their own pursuit of happiness.
Emancipation Proclamation
This Proclamation may not set one-slave free today or tomorrow because the Proclamation is like an arrow. The army is the bow. An arrow without a bow is a poor thing. This Proclamation without an army cannot affect much; but with an army it may produce important results. And as to that, the Lord God of love is also the Lord God of hosts. The God of justice is the God of battles. And since we have conformed to the decrees of eternal justice, may we now believe that the armies of heaven and of the earth will give us victory? I believe that they will.
Though we may not have yet set free one slave, we have set this government free, and we have set this great nation free; and that is a great deal. You and I have no longer the responsibility of the slavery of three millions of men by our relations to a government which endorses their servitude.
 |
| Crowds of Newly Freed Enslaved People Celebrate with a Copy of the Emancipation in Hand, 1864 |
There is one feature in the Proclamation to which I desire to call your attention, and that is the declaration of the Commander-in-Chief of the armies of these United States that the slaves set free should be employed in the military service of the government. I thank God for that. It is a most potent step.
When the President, recognizing the liberty of these oppressed people, declares that they shall be protected and received into the army, and allowed to hold forts and perform other military service, he has taken a second great step over and above the declaration of their freedom. For it prevents the motives for an irregular and savage warfare on their part, should they be provoked to any such folly. It provides a way in which whatever resistance they may please to make against their oppressors may be under the direction of the military authorities of this nation.
Southern Compromise
We are sure the South will respond to this act with a counter proclamation to retain slavery in it's strongest form. And then, when it is proclamation against proclamation, government against government, and people against people, there will be no such thing as compromise, there will be no chance for amicable settlement, as for a long time there has not been. And you must lie down and let them walk over your necks, or they must lie down and you must walk over their necks. We may just as well look at it as it is. We may just as well understand the literal truth, and prepare ourselves for the one thing or the other.
The South does not mean compromise. They have taken their ear of corn, and husked it, and there is no husk left. They have shelled it, and there is no cob left. Their cause is clear kernel and meal, nothing else. And we may as well husk our ear now, and see everything in the grit and grain, and put our absoluteness against their absoluteness, and go forward with the old war-cry, God and Justice, and let that prevail which God pleases to make triumphant.
 |
| Compromise With the South (1864), by Thomas Nast |
I am willing to take the risk. I am willing to have one more battle-field, illustrious above every other ; because never since the sun shone, never since governments were ordained, has there been an issue so absolute, so perpendicular, so crystalline, so devoid of all side issues, as this issue between absolute liberty and absolute slavery; between aristocracy and democracy; between the spirit of Christianity and the infidelity of oppression.
In the name of God, in the name of Christ, in the name of the Holy Ghost, for the sake of humanity, and for the love of mankind, let this conflict go on till victory is declared on one side or the other. But I believe that we are going on the Gulf-Stream of a Divine belief that we, as a nation, are being swept down a course that has been appointed from the foundation of the world, and that the counsels of eternity are guiding that movement by which we are dancing like bubbles on the waves of the sea.
Babylon is Burning
The kings of the earth, who have committed fornication, and lived deliciously with Babylon, shall bewail her, and lament for her. They want mediation. They are very anxious to have peace, when they shall see the smoke of Babylon burning, standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying "Alas, alas, that great city Babylon, that mighty city!"
For in one-hour their judgment came. And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her; for no man buyeth their merchandise any more. The merchandise of gold and silver and precious stones, pearls, fine linen, purple silk, scarlet, all types of wood, all manner vessels of ivory, all manner vessels of the most precious wood, of brass, iron, marble, cinnamon, odors, ointments, frankincense, wine, oil, fine flour, wheat, beasts, sheep, horses, chariots, slaves, and souls of men.
 |
| The fall of Babylon, John Martin, mezzotint with etching, 1835 |
The merchants of these things, which were made rich by Babylon, shall stand afar off, for the fear of her torment, weeping and wailing, and saying, "Alas, alas, that great city that was clothed in fine linen, and purple, and scarlet, and decked with gold, and precious stones, and pearls!" For one hour so great riches come to nought. And every ship-master, and all the company in ships, and sailors, and all who traded by sea, stood afar off, and cried when they saw the smoke of Babylon burning, saying, "What city is like unto this great city!"
In one hour Babylon was made desolate. Rejoice over her, thou heaven, and ye holy apostles and prophets. For God hath avenged you on her. And a mighty angel took up a stone like a great millstone, and cast it into the sea, saying, "Thus with violence shall that great city Babylon be thrown down, and shall be found no more at all.” So may slavery, racism and oppression perish, and those that uphold it!