[3]
[Footnote 1: Meade, _Sermons of Thomas Bacon_, pp. 31 et seq.]
[Footnote 2: Meade, _Sermons of Thomas Bacon_, pp. 116 _et seq._]
[Footnote 3: _Ibid._, p. 118.]
With almost equal zeal did Bishops Williams and Butler plead the same
cause.[1] They deplored the fact that because of their dark skins
Negro slaves were treated as a species different from the rest of
mankind. Denouncing the more cruel treatment of slaves as cattle,
unfit for mental and moral improvement, these churchmen asserted that
the highest property possible to be acquired in servants could not
cancel the obligation to take care of the religious instruction of
those who "despicable as they are in the eyes of man are nevertheless
the creatures of God."[2]
[Footnote 1: _Special Report of the U.S. Com. of Ed._, 1871, p. 363.]
[Footnote 2: _Special Report of the U.S. Com. of Ed_., 1871, p. 363.]
On account of these appeals made during the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries a larger number of slaves of the English colonies were
thereafter treated as human beings capable of mental, moral, and
spiritual development. Some masters began to provide for the
improvement of these unfortunates, not because they loved them, but
because instruction would make them more useful to the community.
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