The Christian Slavery Owners Struggle With Abolitionist Movement

The abolitionist movement started with Christian slave owners struggling with the idea that there is no distinction between Jew or Greek, black or white. Influenced by the suffering and racialization on plantations, they believed that God wanted slavery to be abolished and saw it as a monstrous sin. The Protestant belief in the purgative fire of the spirit likened the abolitionist movement to a blazing fire. In 1814, the British Foreign Secretary had to demand the end of the slave trade during negotiations in Vienna.