The theme of this reading is "appealing." Not in the "attractive" sense of the word, but instead to make a serious or urgent request.
Slavery has been in our world for a long time. Although it has gone through phases, it is still the same concept: people are owned by people. John Wesley is writing this in a time where slavery is the biggest and most commercial trade that it has ever been.
I think it's incredibly interesting that Wesley writes about where the slaves are brought from - especially their country. He asks of their home, "Is it so remarkably horrid, dreary, and barren, that it is a kindness to
deliver them out of it? I believe many have apprehended so; but it is
an entire mistake, if we may give credit to those who have lived many
years therein, and could have no motive to misrepresent it."
I didn't know that there were people who thought that bringing Africans to Europe was "saving" them from horrible living conditions. I thought that everyone just knew exactly what they were doing. I can see now though that in that time they didn't have a lot of access to information about Africa, so "bad guys" could feed them lies about how they were helping them out.
Slavery has been abolished, but that doesn't mean it has gone away. While there isn't a commercial slave trade, there are still people being used in other countries. There is sex slavery, which is prevalent not only in other countries but also the United States.
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