He thought that others who did not own so many should share in the expense of maintaining for them a common teacher.
[Footnote 1: _An Account of the Endeavors Used by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel in Foreign Parts_, pp.

16, 21, and 32; and Dalcho, _An Historical Account_, etc., pp.

104 et seq.] Equally censorious of these neglectful masters was Reverend Thomas Bacon, the rector of the Parish Church in Talbot County, Maryland.
In 1749 he set forth his protest in four sermons on "the great and indispensable duty of all Christian masters to bring up their slaves in the knowledge and fear of God."[1] Contending that slaves should enjoy rights like those of servants in the household of the patriarchs, Bacon insisted that next to one's children and brethren by blood, one's servants, and especially one's slaves, stood in the nearest relation to him, and that in return for their drudgery the master owed it to his bondmen to have them enlightened.

He believed that the reading and explaining of the Holy Scriptures should be made a stated duty.

In the course of time the place of catechist in each family might be supplied out of the intelligent slaves by choosing such among them as were best taught to instruct the rest.[2] He was of the opinion, too, that were some of the slaves taught to read, were they sent to school for that purpose when young, were they given the New Testament and other good books to be read at night to their fellow-servants, such a course would vastly increase their knowledge of God and direct their minds to a serious thought of futurity.[3] [Footnote 1: Meade, _Sermons of Thomas Bacon_, pp.