Some of the clergy then interested had not at first seriously objected to the enslavement of the African race, believing that the lot of these people would not be worse in this country where they might have an opportunity for enlightenment.

But when this result failed to follow, and when the slavery of the Africans' bodies turned out to be the slavery of their minds, the philanthropic and religious proclaimed also the doctrine of enlightenment as a right of man.
Desiring to see Negroes enjoy this privilege, Jonathan Boucher,[1] one of the most influential of the colonial clergymen, urged his hearers at the celebration of the Peace of 1763 to improve and emancipate their slaves that they might "participate in the general joy." With the hope of inducing men to discharge the same duty, Bishop Warburton[2] boldly asserted a few years later that slaves are "rational creatures endowed with all our qualities except that of color, and our brethren both by nature and grace." John Woolman,[3] a Quaker minister, influenced by the philosophy of John Locke, began to preach that liberty is the right of all men, and that slaves, being the fellow-creatures of their masters, had a natural right to be elevated.
[Footnote 1: Jonathan Boucher was a rector of the Established Church in Maryland.

Though not a promoter of the movement for the political rights of the colonists, Boucher was, however, so moved by the spirit of uplift of the downtrodden that he takes front rank among those who, in emphasizing the rights of servants, caused a decided change in the attitude of white men toward the improvement of Negroes.

Boucher was not an immediate abolitionist.

He abhorred slavery, however, to the extent that he asserted that if ever the colonies would be improved to their utmost capacity, an essential part of that amelioration had to be the abolition of slavery.