I must think there is some misunderstanding; for I have made no high claims about capacity for _self-rule_, as if laws and penalties were to be done away.

But the question is, shall human beings, who (as all of us) are imperfect, be controlled by public law, or by individual caprice?
Was not my reviewer intending to advocate some form of _serfdom_ which is compatible with legal rights, and recognizes the serf as a man; not _slavery_ which pronounces him a chattel?
Serfdom and apprenticeship we may perhaps leave to be reasoned down by economists and administrators; slavery proper is what I attacked as essentially immoral.
Returning then to the arguments, I reason against them as if I did not know their author .-- I have distinctly avowed, that the effort to liberate Christian slaves was creditable: I merely add, that in this respect Christianity is no better than Mohammedism.

But is it really no moral fault,--is it not a moral enormity,--to deny that Pagans have human rights?
"That Christianity opened its arms _at all_ to the servile class, _was enough_." Indeed! Then either unconverted men have no natural right to freedom, or Christians may withhold a natural right from them.

Under the plea of "bringing them to God," Christians are to deny by law, to every slave who refuses to be converted, the rights of husband and father, rights of persons, rights of property, rights over his own body.

Thus manumission is a bribe to make hypocritical converts, and Christian superiority a plea for depriving men of their dearest rights.