Reading the American Past: Printed Page 77

Documents from Reading the American Past, Chapter 5

Introduction to the Documents

Eighteenth-century colonists lived in a world of change. Older certainties of faith eroded. New patterns of commerce spread. Choices abounded. Where to live? What faith to profess? What kind of work to do? What goods to buy and sell? These and other choices made many colonists think about changing themselves through education, training, discipline, introspection, or religious conversion, among other ways. For slaves, choices were far fewer than for free colonists, a reality many slaves understood all too well since they had suffered enslavement as free people in Africa. The documents that follow illustrate the different choices available to slaves, immigrants, and native-born free white colonists. The choices they made helped create the changes they all experienced.