Neither can men, by the same principles, be considered as lands, goods, or houses, among possessions.  It is necessary that all property should be inferiour to its possessor.  But how does the slave differ from his master, but by chance?  For though the mark, with which the latter is pleased to brand him, shews, at the first sight, the difference of their fortune; what mark can be found in his nature, that can warrant a distinction?

To this consideration we shall add the following, that if men can justly become the property of each other, their children, like the offspring of cattle, must inherit their paternal lot.  Now, as the actions of the father and the child must be thus at the sole disposal of their common master, it is evident, that the authority of the one, as a parent, and the duty of the other, as a child, must be instantly annihilated; rights and obligations, which, as they are sounded in nature, are implanted in our feelings, and are established by the voice of God, must contain in their annihilation a solid argument to prove, that there cannot be any property whatever in the human species.

We may consider also, as a farther confirmation, that it is impossible, in the nature of things, that liberty can be bought or sold!  It is neither saleable, nor purchasable.  For if any one man can have an absolute property in the liberty of another, or, in other words, if he, who is called a master, can have a just right to command the actions of him, who is called a slave, it is evident that the latter cannot be accountable for those crimes, which the former may order him to commit.  Now as every reasonable being is accountable for his actions, it is evident, that such a right cannot justly exist, and that human liberty, of course, is beyond the possibility either of sale or purchase.  Add to this, that, whenever you sell the liberty of a man, you have the power only of alluding to the body:  the mind cannot be confined or bound:  it will be free, though its mansion be beset with chains.  But if, in every sale of the human species, you are under the necessity of considering your slave in this abstracted light; of alluding only to the body, and of making no allusion to the mind; you are under the necessity also of treating him, in the same moment, as a brute, and of abusing therefore that nature, which cannot otherwise be considered, than in the double capacity of soul and body.