"It follows from the very nature of the case, that the slave has an absolute right to make himself free; that if any one has hired himself for any crime, such as robbery, murder, &c. this contract is of itself null and void and that every one is at full liberty to break it."
"The same may be said of all religious submission to a priest, who sets up for my father confessor (step-father, &c.); for a matter of such purely internal interest must be settled by every man himself and alone. A religiosity, a part of which is deposited in the hands of another is tantamount to none at all; for the Spirit is one, and it is he that is required to dwell in the heart of man; the union of the per and pro se must belong to every individual apart."
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES.
Punctuation was not corrected except for the quotation mark on page 20, and the parenthesis on page 30, as cited below. Likewise, inconsistencies in hyphenation have not been corrected.
On page 6, "necessaay" was replaced with "[necessary]".
On page 8, "[of]" was inserted between "city" and "New York".
On page 10, "[the]" was inserted before "City of".
On page 12, "catastrophies" was replaced with "[catastrophes]", and "pretentions" was replaced with "[pretensions]".
On page 15, "the the" was replaced with "[the]".