Slavery is a large part of american history because it was such a huge part of how america got started. People used slaves to mass produce not only crops but also goods that were consumed and exported. Many if not most of the slaveowners just wanted money and that is the reason they mistreated the slaves because they wanted to save money. These slaveowners mistreated the slaves because they saw them as property and not humans. The slaveowners did not want others to know that that was the reason they mistreated the slaves so, they justified these atrocious actions with passages of scripture. The slaves were often starved and whipped as a punishment for simple accidents.Throughout his narrative he uses strong rhetoric to disprove pragmatic and religious arguments that support pro- slavery.
              

In the Pragmatic argument people may argue that slavery is the way that things are supposed to be. Many southerners argue that slavery is a tradition and that if slavery ended things just would be off or even wrong. Douglas uses rhetoric to not only counter this argument but also to explain why slavery is wrong. He uses rhetoric when he says,” when I first went to live with her, she treated me as she supposed one human being ought to treat another” page 43. This quote counters the argument because it shows that human beings treat others how they believe they should, in this case with kindness. But when her husband told her that he was beneath her she treated him how others thought she had to treat him. This just goes to show that people will do anything to fit in and following tradition is a perfect example of how people do things that others do just because they want to fit in. This shows how wrong slavery is because it corrupts the human instinct. The human instinct is to be kind to people that deserve kindness. Douglas uses Logos to explain how wrong it is because it is just common sense that you are nice to people that have done nothing to offend or hurt you.
               

In the religious argument some people may argue that slavery is justified by the word of god but it is not. Slave owners believed that black men were beasts and where evil and that is why their skin was colored. In scripture it states that god with punish all evil and it says nothing about men taking matters into their own hands. Douglas uses rhetoric when he says, “he that knoweth his master’s will, and doeth not, shall be beaten with many stripes’’ page 57. Douglas shows how wrong this is because when slave owners use this verse it is almost as if they were “playing” god and they had all of the power. The author uses Ethos in with this quote because the slave owners are using god as a credible excuse to beat the slaves. This shows how wrong this is because the slave owners use god as an excuse to not only beat but also mistreat the slaves.
             

The examples above show how Douglas uses rhetoric throughout the book to show how wrong and horrendous slavery was. Douglas believed that slavery was wrong and he wanted other people to realise the horrors that truly happened in the plantations that slave owners had. These are also the ways that Douglas uses Logos and Ethos to contradict the pro-slavery arguments that slave owners defend. Those are the ways that Douglas used rhetoric to defend his beliefs.