A biography of writer and activist Benjamin Lay, who was a prominent early campaigner for the end of enslavement in the United States in the early 18th century. The book gives an account of Lay's youth in Essex and London, his travels to Barbados as a sailor, where he became radicalised against the slave trade, and his subsequent lifelong work to draw public attention to its barbarism, influenced by his Quaker faith. The book also outlines Lay's impact and legacy in Quakerism and the abolitionist movement after his death. Includes 12 pages of colour plates.