ABSTRACT
The slave-holder claims the slave as his Property. The very idea of a slave is, that be belongs to another, that he is bound to live and labour for another, to be another’s instrument, and to make another’s will his habitual law, however adverse to his own. The very essence of slavery is, to put a man defenceless into the hands of another. The right claimed by the master, to task, to force, to imprison, to whip, and to punish the slave, at discretion, and especially to prevent the least resistance to his will, is a virtual denial and subversion of all the rights of the victim of his power. The equality of nature makes slavery a wrong. The highest intelligences recognise their own nature, their own rights, in the humblest, human being.
