Dominion: The Making of the Western Mind

by Tom Holland

Gregory was moved by the existence of slavery not just to condemn the extremes of wealth and poverty, but to define the institution itself as an unpardonable offence against God. Human nature, so he preached, had been constituted by its Creator as something free. As such, it was literally priceless. ‘Not all the universe would constitute an adequate payment for the soul of a mortal.’9 This, for his congregation, was altogether too radical, too seditious a perspective to take seriously: for how, as Basil himself put it, were those of inferior intelligence and capabilities to survive, if not as slaves? Unsurprisingly, then, Gregory’s abolitionism met with little support. The existence of slavery as damnable but necessary continued to be taken for granted by most Christians – Basil included. Only when heaven was joined with earth would it cease to exist. Gregory’s impassioned insistence that to own slaves was ‘to set one’s own power above God’s’,10 and to trample on a dignity that was properly the right of every man and woman, fell like seed among thorns.