595).
Luther himself quotes, in a sermon on "Genesis," the instances of Abraham and Abimelech and other Old Testament worthies, as justifying slavery and the treatment of a slave as a beast of burden.

"Sheep, cattle, men-servants and maid-servants, they were all possessions," says Luther, "to be sold as it pleased them like other beasts.

It were even a good thing were it still so.

For else no man may compel nor tame the servile folk" (_Saemmtliche Werke_, vol.xv.p.

276).