No eloquence could persuade him, that the Africans were torn from their
country and their dearest connections, merely that they might lead a
happier life; or that they could be placed under the uncontrolled dominion
of others without suffering. Arbitrary power would spoil the hearts of the
best. Hence would arise tyranny on the one side, and a sense of injury on
the other. Hence the passions would be let loose, and a state of perpetual
enmity would follow.
He needed only to go to the accounts of those who defended the system of
slavery, to show that it was cruel. He was forcibly struck last year by an
expression of an honourable member, an advocate for the trade, who, when
he came to speak of the slaves, on selling off the stock of a plantation,
said, that they fetched less than the common price, because they were
damaged.--Damaged!--What! were they goods and chattels? What an idea was
this to hold out of our fellow-creatures. We might imagine how slaves were
treated, if they could be spoken of in such a manner. Perhaps these unhappy
people had lingered out the best part of their lives in the service of
their master. Able then to do but little, they were sold for little! and
the remaining substance of their sinews was to be pressed out by another,
yet more hardened than the former, and who had made a calculation of their
vitals accordingly.
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