The opposition of John Eliot to the enslavement of Indians during King Philip’s War was similar to that shown by Roger Williams during the Pequot War, though perhaps it was prompted by a more nearly unselfish and humanitarian motive. Throughout the war Eliot remonstrated strongly against selling the captive Indians into slavery. In a letter, June 13, 1675, to the governor and council at Boston, he stated his reasons for opposing the enslavement of the captives. He first urged a politic reason: that such enslavement was likely to prolong the war and bring still further disaster upon the land by rousing the Indians to renewed hostilities. He then emphasized the Christian attitude of mercy by asserting that it is the design of Christ “not to extirpate nations but to Gospelize them”. “To sell souls for money,” he continued, “seems to me a dangerous merchandise. To sell them away from all means of grace, when Christ has provided means of grace for them, is the way for us to be active in the destroying of their souls.” His plea for mercy was strengthened, also, by calling attention to the letters patent of the king which urged the Indians’ conversion rather than their destruction.[1228] Some faint opposition to the enslavement of Indians was expressed by Samuel Sewall of Massachusetts in 1706, called forth by an act passed by Massachusetts against Indians and negroes. Perhaps something was accomplished by the protest, though the act either failed to pass or was repealed, since no trace of it remains.[1229] In 1729, Ralph Sandiford published a work entitled: “The Mystery of Iniquity in a Brief Examination of the Practice of the Times.” In the dedication of his book, he speaks of going to South Carolina, and of refusing the bounty of a rich colonist there because his riches had been obtained through the labor of negro and Indian slaves. He declares that negroes and Indians who are the Lord’s freemen cannot be slaves to Christians.[1230] He further asserts that the matter he is aiming at is “this trading in mankind, which is pernicious to the Publick, but more especially to the common-wealth of Israel; which raised forth a zeal in Men for the House of the Lord, which would have even consumed men had not I witnessed against this rottenness and hypocrisy that would introduce itself amongst the saints, whereby, as way-marks, they lead many into the same corrupt practice which is contrary to the Principal of Truth, which is over the Heads of such Transgressors, that the Righteous in all Churches are undefiled with it, for their Bodies are the Temples of the Holy Ghost to dwell in, which they cannot defile with Babylon, who is Harloted from the Truth to feed upon the Flesh or receive nourishment from the blood of the poor Negro or Indian captive, or whomsoever ravenous Nature (which is the Beast’s work) has power to prey upon”.[1231]