Harriet Beecher Stowe demonstrates in the novel, a slave owner and a slave trader, who out of necessity for wealth needed to harden their hearts by being dehumanized. The success of the slave …show more content…
Mr. Shelby is known as a gentle master but he involuntarily hardens his heart and sells his trusted slave, he says “to tell the truth, it’s only hard necessity makes me willing to sell at all. I don’t like parting with any of my hands that’s a fact.”(808). He attempted to escape from the process of dehumanization, in order to be considered as a “humane man”(808). Stowe usage of language such as “hard necessity” to emphasize that Mr. Shelby is selling his slave as a last resort . Mr. Shelby compelled by economic pressures to harden his heart by “putting a constraint on[his] feelings”(823) and ultimately betraying and selling his most trust slave, Tom. He emphasizes his trust to Tom by stating “I’ve trusted him, since then, with everything I have,-money, house, horses,-and I always found him true and square in everything.”(808) Besides, Mr. Shelby being forced to harden his heart out of necessity, Mr. Hale a slave trader was also forced to harden his heart. Mr. Hale being a slave trader, witnesses the devastation on families and friends of the slaves. Mr. Hale makes his wealth by buying and selling slaves and he dehumanizes himself out of the necessity to making money “if I make pretty