Vanquished by the logic of Daniel Davis[1] and Benjamin Rush,[2] those who had theretofore justified slavery on the ground that it gave the bondmen a chance to be enlightened, fell back on the theory of African racial inferiority.
This they said was so well exhibited by the Negroes' lack of wisdom and of goodness that continued heathenism of the race was justifiable.[3] Answering these inconsistent persons, John Wesley inquired: "Allowing them to be as stupid as you say, to whom is that stupidity owing?
Without doubt it lies altogether at the door of the inhuman masters who give them no opportunity for improving their understanding and indeed leave them no motive, either from hope or fear to attempt any such thing." Wesley asserted, too, that the Africans were in no way remarkable for their stupidity while they remained in their own country, and that where they had equal motives and equal means of improvement, the Negroes were not only not inferior to the better inhabitants of Europe, but superior to some of them.[4] [Footnote 1: Davis was a logical antislavery agitator.

He believed that if the slaves had had the means of education, if they had been treated with humanity, making slaves of them had been no more than doing evil that good might come.

He thought that Christianity and humanity would have rather dictated the sending of books and teachers into Africa and endeavors for their salvation.] [Footnote 2: Benjamin Rush was a Philadelphia physician of Quaker parentage.

He was educated at the College of New Jersey and at the Medical School of Edinburgh, where he came into contact with some of the most enlightened men of his time.

Holding to the ideals of his youth, Dr.Rush was soon associated with the friends of the Negroes on his return to Philadelphia.