Human Bondage, Wealth, and Humanity Theme Analysis

A Mercy takes place during a time in American history when labor was being exploited throughout the colonies through various forms of human bondage. Morrison’s characters suffer under the variety of forms of bondage that were common in the late 17th century, from lifelong, hereditary chattel slavery (as in the case of first-generation slaves trafficked from Africa and their descendants) to indentured servitude, a system in which Europeans committed to a certain number of years of labor in return for the payment of their passage to America.

In both cases, slaves and indentured servants were considered to be the property of their master. The systems, however, differed greatly. For example, slaves were never compensated for their work, while indentured servants received money for their voyage to the colonies in return for their anticipated labor. Additionally, slave status was passed on to the children of slaves, while indentured servants were freed after the end of their work contract. (Though indentured servants still often had their contracts elongated arbitrarily, leaving them to provide their labor for indefinite periods.) Unlike indentured servants, and because of their race, slaves were also horrifically unprotected under law. As Jacob notes at one point in the book, the law even allowed black and native slaves to be shot by a white man for any and all reasons. While slavery clearly was a far more unjust and inhumane system than indentured servitude, both systems are forms of human bondage that violate modern moral codes and working laws.

Throughout her novel, Morrison suggests how both forms of bondage (chattel slavery and indentured servitude) break the spirits of the people suffering under them. Jacob clearly notices this oppressive, inhumane effect when he draws comparisons between his disgust with slavery and his observation of the look of surrender in the eyes of a beaten horse, clearly implying how the violence slaves face is torturous to the human spirit. Meanwhile, the indentured servant Scully offers an example of how bondage forces people to make choices that go against their own sense of righteousness. Morrison shows how Scully would like to help Lina, Florens, and Sorrow after Jacob’s death, but he cannot do very much because he is afraid that if he does Rebekka will sell him, and so he will never have his freedom.

Among Morrison’s 17th-century white, unbonded characters, however, there is a plethora of different feelings about the prevalent presence of human bondage in the colonies. For example, D’Ortega, a Catholic slave trader with whom Jacob does business, has no moral qualms about the fact that he profits significantly from buying and selling other people. Jacob, meanwhile, is morally repulsed by the slave trade, finding it completely unsavory and insisting that “flesh is not his commodity,” and calling it a “degraded” business. Jacob also clearly empathizes with slaves and comprehends their humanity. Upon seeing Florens, Jacob feels sympathy for her because of his own status as an orphan as a child, identifying with the young slave girl even though he is a free white man. But despite Jacob’s aversion to slavery, he does accept Florens as payment for D’Ortega’s debt without even entertaining the idea of freeing her. Moreover, after Jacob visits D’Ortega’s house, he becomes more and more interested in acquiring wealth. Jacob manifests this obsession in his desire to build a mansion house. As Jacob tries to make the dream a reality, he invests more and more in the slave trade. So while Jacob is disgusted by slavery, he is content to profit from it financially, making him complicit in the entire inhumane system.

Through Jacob, Morrison seems to suggest the impossibility of building wealth in the colonial economy without becoming complicit in slavery. However, although the slave trade seems to be a boon for white traders like Jacob and D’Ortega, it also carries the possibility of backlash and ruin for them while destroying their moral fiber. Early in the novel, Jacob alludes to Bacon’s Rebellion, a 1676 uprising in which slaves and indentured servants united to attempt to overthrow their wealthy white masters and gain control. Bacon’s Rebellion terrified slave owners because it revealed the real danger they could face as a result of their cruelty and inhumanity. This uprising encouraged slave owners to further restrict the rights of black people and natives, and to encourage racism among poor white colonial residents in order to separate the two populations that together posed a real threat to the power and control of rich Europeans.

Moreover, in the book’s final chapter Morrison suggests that, while slavery is fundamentally based on denying another human’s humanity, slave owners are the ones whose humanity is ultimately threatened. During Florens’s mother’s narrative, Florens describes Jacob as human, unlike D’Ortega, suggesting that, through his cruelty, D’Ortega has become other-than-human. Morrison clearly shows that, although bondage produces wealth for slave owners and the owners of indentured servants, bondage is a horrific and thoroughly reprehensible system with terrible consequences for all involved.