“But should slavery be at any time, or in any country, or part of a country, utterly extinguished, it will ever remain true that ownership, or property in man is not in itself wrong, and that it may be benevolent to all concerned.  It is interesting to recollect that in proportion as human relations are cardinal, or vital, they approach most nearly to ownership, as in the case of parent and child.  The highest relation of all, that between man and God, finds its most perfect expression in terms conveying the idea of ownership on the part of God.  ’For ye are not your own;—­therefore glorify God in your body and spirit which are God’s.’  If God should send one of us to a distant part of the universe, under the charge of an angel, where superior intelligence and wisdom were needful for our safety in temptation and amid the bewildering excitements of new scenes, ownership for the time being, absolute dominion over us, on the part of the angel, would be in the highest measure benevolent.  In those days when universal love reigns, it is just as likely as not that there will be more ‘ownership’ in man than ever before.  By ownership I mean such relationships as we see in the households of those who are represented in the letter of the Southern lady to her father.  There we see the weak, the unfortunate, the dependent nature clinging to the stronger, and receiving support and comfort, and even honor, from those who in rendering kindness and in receiving service have their whole being refined and cultivated to the highest degree.  There are no rigors in those relationships; everything which contributes to the welfare and happiness of a serving class is enjoyed, and all its liabilities to care and sorrow are removed, to as great a degree as ever happens in this world.

“Allowing that there are always to be inequalities of mind and condition, and that what we call menial services will need to be performed; that there must be those who will have a disposition and taste to work over a fire all day and prepare food; and that men of business or study will not all be able to groom their own horses and wash their vehicles; and that possibly the Coleridges and Southeys, and their friends the Joseph Cottles, may, from being absorbed in their ideal pursuits, still be ignorant of the way to get off a collar from a horse’s neck, and must call upon a servant-girl to help them, we shall need those who will be glad to be servants forever, and who will require for their own security that their employers shall ‘own’ them, and thus be made responsible for their support and protection.  This may always be necessary for the highest welfare of all concerned.  But the history of this relationship in connection with our human nature has been such, to a great extent, that we associate with it only the idea of pillage, oppression, cruelty.  Already there are cases without number in which no such idea would ever be suggested to a spectator, and they will increase in proportion as Christianity prevails.  There is more real ‘freedom’ in thousands of these cases of nominal slavery than in thousands who are nominally free.  How did it happen that the Hebrew servant, who chose to stay with his master rather than leave his wife and children, was not made nominally free, and apprenticed or hired?  Why was his ear bored, and perpetual relations secured between him and his master?”