Stamped from the Beginning: Chapter 4: Saving Souls, Not Bodies Summary & Analysis

The persecution of Puritans in England escalates in 1660 with the restoration of Charles II to the throne. Across multiple generations, the Cotton and Mather families intermarry, an interlocking sealed with the “triple-knot” of Increase Mather and Maria Cotton’s son, born in 1663 and named Cotton Mather. Across his lifetime, Cotton Mather will help solidify the institution of African slavery in America. He does so under the significant influence of the British minister Richard Baxter’s book A Christian Directory (1664-1665). This book argues that slavery can be fair and “benevolent” as long as it incorporates conversion for the enslaved. Baxter even proposes that there might be some “voluntary” slaves who willingly choose to become enslaved in order to be converted.

In 1667, a law passes in Virginia stipulating that Christian conversion does not affect a person’s enslaved status. That same year, John Locke moves to London and pens a number of influential works of philosophy, including An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding and Two Treaties of Government. While these texts superficially advocate for egalitarian humanism, they do so while vehemently denying the humanity of Africans. In An Essay, Locke claims that West African women had children with monkeys. This polygenesis theory soon gained widespread support—not least among enslavers in the British colonies.

In 1675, colonists kill 3,000 Native Americans during King Philip’s War. During this period, abolitionist ideas begin circulating among religious sects such as Quakers and Mennonites. In 1688, a group of Mennonites write the Germantown Petition Against Slavery, the “inaugural antiracist tract among European settlers in colonial America.” Like much of the later antiracist movement, the tract is based on the principle of the Golden Rule. Ultimately the Mennonite’s petition is swiftly suppressed by Philadelphia Quakers who are themselves enslavers. 

Meanwhile, in 1676, Increase Mather prays fervently for the defeat of the Native American sachem Metacomet (known in English as King Philip). When Metacomet is killed, the Puritans dismember his body and Cotton Mather, then only 14, breaks the jaw from his skull. That same year, Bacon’s Rebellion successfully burns down Jamestown only to ultimately be defeated. This rebellion is a coalition of poor white workers and enslaved Black people fighting together against the white elite; concerned, legislators introduce further punishments for white people who collaborate with Africans and give all white people “absolute power to abuse any African person.”

In 1674, the already fanatically pious Cotton Mather becomes the youngest Harvard student ever at the age of 11. After graduating, he cofounds the Boston Philosophical Society with his father, Increase. This is a time in which “scientific” views about race are becoming increasingly complex, with scholars asserting that white people are the primary, original human race. This idea often goes hand-in-hand with claims about Black hypersexuality and physical superiority, which have the overall effect of making Black people seem more akin to animals than humans. Following King Philip’s War, conflict escalates over the extent of royal control over the American colonies. Increase is horrified by the idea of losing autonomous control of New England to the crown. In 1689, New Englanders begin a rebellion.