Seven millions of slaves in America—Slavery originated in the African slave trade—Slave-trade unprovoked—Excited by lust for gold—Commenced by the Portuguese in 1434—Spaniards in 1511—English in 1556—President Edwards quoted—100,000 annually destroyed—Report made to the British House of Commons—Startling statistics—A slave ship described—Slave-trade declared to be piracy and abolishedpage 13

CHAPTER II.
SLAVERY DEFINED.
PROPERTY IN A HUMAN BEING.

A slave is a chattel—Authorities quoted—Advertised and sold as property—Facts adduced—sale of a boy—a woman with an infant in her arms—a mother—American slave-code identical in principle with the Romanpage 30

CHAPTER III.
SLAVERY ILLUSTRATED.
THE CHATTEL PRINCIPLE IN PRACTICE.

Slaves denied an education—Laws—Instances—Slavery disregards matrimonial connections—Painful factspage 41

CHAPTER IV.
SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.

Slavery disregards the parental and filial relations—Facts—Slave-mother’s lamentpage 56

CHAPTER V.
SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.

Slavery utterly impoverishes its victims—Exposes them to unbridled lust—unrestrained passion—irresponsible tyranny—Heart-rending incidents!page 64

CHAPTER VI.
SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.

Severity of laws against slaves—partial—unreasonable and cruel—Practice worse than the laws—Burning of slaves—Horrible examplespage 80

CHAPTER VII.
SLAVERY AND RELIGION.

Curse of Canaan—Doubtful authority—Did not allude to slavery—A mere prediction at best—Africans not the descendants of Canaanpage 88

CHAPTER VIII.
SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.

Patriarchal servitude and slavery—No patriarch ever owned a slave—Slavery had no existence in the time of the patriarchs—Diodorus, AthenÆus and Rollin quoted—The Hebrew word SERVANT not equivalent to the English word SLAVE—Abraham’s servants converts from idolatrypage 94

CHAPTER IX.
SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.

Law of Moses and slavery—Levitical statutes not perfect—Allowed what it would now be wrong to practice—Dr. Stowe quoted—Servitude under the law of Moses essentially different from American slavery—Meaning of “buy,” “heathen,” “bondmen,” and “forever,”—Servants not stolen—Voluntary—Provision for religious improvement—Kind treatment—Could not be sold—Equal to their masters—Certain emancipation—Salvation of the heathen the primary design of introducing foreign servantspage 107

CHAPTER X.
SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.

New Testament and slavery—Servants mentioned but not SLAVES—Doulos does not mean SLAVE—New Testament does not regulate slavery because it cannot be regulated—Slaveholders not addressed by the Apostles—Onesimus not a slave—Character of Roman slavery—Contrary to the fundamental principles of revealed religion—The character of God—Common origin of man—General Redemption—Moral precepts—And is necessarily unjust and unequalpage 124

CHAPTER XI.
AMERICAN CHURCHES AND SLAVERY.
THE POSITION THEY OCCUPY.

Presbyterians (O. S. and N. S.)—Congregational—Methodist Episcopal, North and South—Methodist Protestant—Wesleyan Methodist Connection—Baptist, Regular—Freewill—Seventh Day—Evangelical Association—United Brethren—Various Churches—Summary Viewpage 149

CHAPTER XII.
SLAVERY AND THE CHURCH.
NON-FELLOWSHIP WITH SLAVEHOLDERS.

Scriptural view—Church must keep slaveholders out—If they get in, it must expel them—If the Church sanction slavery officially or practically, withdraw from it—Non-slaveholding required that it may be holy—The pillar of truth—That it may honor the Scriptures—Convert the world—Be faithful to slaveholders and to slaves—Non-fellowship required by decency—humanity—If fellowshiped, we shall have slaveholding preachers, and women-sellers and cradle-plunderers for class-mates—Cases givenpage 169

CHAPTER XIII.
SAME SUBJECT CONTINUED.
OBJECTIONS ANSWERED.

Kind slaveholders—Examples—Excusable slaveholders—Slavery a political matter—Fault of the public corruption—Fault of the laws—Slaveholders from necessity—Slaves their property—All right ONLY this one thing—Take them in to convince them of the wrong—Mr. Fee’s opinionpage 184

CHAPTER XIV.
POLITICAL DUTIES OF CHRISTIANS.
EXTIRPATION OF SLAVERY FROM THE WORLD.

Necessity of government—Obligation of political action—Voters responsible for slavery—United States Constitution does not endorse slavery—Founders of the Republic intended that slavery should die out speedily—Character of the government changed—Great work for Christian citizens—Slavery in the District—Territories—Slave States—Throughout the worldpage 195

CHAPTER XV.
ABOLITION OF SLAVERY.
IMMEDIATE EMANCIPATION.

The duty plain and scriptural—Break every yoke—proclaim a year of Jubilee—Slavery cannot be reformed—Slaves prepared for freedom—Free people of color—Fugitives in Canada—West India emancipation—Colored people not dangerous when free—Amalgamation—Our fears originate in our guilt—Colonization scheme impracticable—Wrong—Watkins quoted—All objections mere excuses—We must emancipate to escape the judgments of God—Too long delayed—A good examplepage 206

CHAPTER XVI.
WHAT OF THE NIGHT?
THERE IS HOPE IN GOD ONLY.

The government intensely pro-slavery—Political horizon lowering—The great denominations and benevolent societies heartily supporting slavery—Ecclesiastical heavens dark—Deep prejudices in the masses of the people—Douglass quoted—God is on the side of the oppressed—He is stirring the nation—Question cannot rest—Agitation goes on—Truth is on the side of the slave—Literature coming to his aid—A pure Church arising to plead his cause—“Toil and trust.”page 219