The opening of Chapter I
No subject more pleasing than that of the removal of evils.--Evils have existed almost from the beginning of the world; but there is a power in our nature to counteract them--this power increased by Christianity.--Of the evils removed by Christianity one of the greatest is the Slave Trade.--The joy we ought to feel on its abolition from a contemplation of the nature of it; and of the extent of it; and of the difficulty of subduing it.--Usefulness also of the contemplation of this subject.
I scarcely know of any subject, the contemplation of which is more pleasing, than that of the correction or of the removal of any of the acknowledged evils of life; for while we rejoice to think that the sufferings of our fellow-creatures have been thus, in any instance, relieved, we must rejoice equally to think, that our own moral condition must have been necessarily improved by the change.