Corruption of Christianity

Where it surfaces

• Preface to the 1853 Edition

  Brown argues that professed Christians and clergy who own slaves give the system legitimacy, and that true abolition requires exposing their hypocrisy.

• Going to the South

  A clergyman purchases Currer for house service, highlighting the hypocrisy of religious figures participating in the slave trade.

• III: The Negro Chase

  Ministers and magistrates use the public execution to preach obedience to slaves, twisting religious authority to uphold slavery.

• The Religious Teacher

  Snyder's sermon and the catechism distort Christian teachings to enforce slave obedience, while Georgiana presents a genuine Christian abolitionist perspective.

• X: The Young Christian

  Georgiana argues that Southern Christians and ministers distort the Bible to justify slavery, making Christianity complicit in oppression.

• XI: The Parson Poet

  Mr. Peck, a Christian parson, writes a racist poem dehumanizing a slave child and defends the use of enslaved people for medical dissection, revealing the moral hypocrisy of slaveholding Christianity.

• A Slave Hunting Parson

  Mr. Peck and Jones use religion to justify slavery and maintain control, while participating in brutal violence like hunting slaves with dogs.

• XVIII: The Liberator

  The Carltons reject Snyder's sermons as tools to keep slaves docile, instead teaching the gospel in its pure form, which the slaves appreciate.

• XX: A True Democrat

  The mention of a Catholic clergyman performing a marriage based on a false blood oath illustrates religious complicity in racial hypocrisy.

• XXI: The Christian’s Death

  Georgiana's true Christian practice is contrasted with the hypocritical priesthood supporting the Fugitive Slave Law.

• A Ride in a Stagecoach

  The Connecticut minister's self-righteous condemnation of the South's Sabbath-breaking and intemperance contrasts with his own region's commercialism, exposing the corruption of religious piety when used for sectional superiority.

• Conclusion

  Brown highlights the extensive slaveholding by American Christian churches, condemning the hypocrisy of a 'pious democratic republic' that traffics in human beings.