d they ought to be nothing more
than what is sufficient to mark and discountenance that spirit.

CIRCUMSTANCES FOR MERCY.

Not being principal.
Probable want of early and deliberate purposes.
Youth where the highest malice does not appear.
Sex where the highest malice does not appear.
Intoxication and levity, or mere wantonness of any kind.

A

LETTER

TO

THE RIGHT HON. HENRY DUNDAS,

ONE OF HIS MAJESTY'S PRINCIPAL SECRETARIES OF STATE.

WITH THE

SKETCH OF A NEGRO CODE.

1792.

Dear Sir,--I should have been punctual in sending you the sketch I
promised of my old African Code, if some friends from London had not
come in upon me last Saturday, and engaged me till noon this day: I send
this packet by one of them who is still here. If what I send be, as
under present circumstances it must be, imperfect, you will excuse it,
as being done near twelve years ago. About four years since I made an
abstract of it, upon which I cannot at present lay my hands; but I hope
the marginal heads will in some measure supply it.

If the African trade could be considered with regard to itself only, and
as a single object, I should think the utter abolition to be on the
whole more advisable than any scheme of regulation an reform. Rather
than suffer it to continue as it is, I heartily wish it at an end. What
has been lately done has been done by a popular spirit, which seldom
calls for, and indeed very rarely relishes, a system made up of a great
variety of parts, and which is to operate its effect in a great length
of time. The people like short methods; the consequences of which they
sometimes have reason to repent of. Abolition is but a single act. To
prove the nature of the trade, and to expose it properly, required,
indeed, a vast collection of materials, which have been laboriously
collected, and compiled with great judgment. It required also much
perseverance and address to excite the spirit which has been excited
without doors, and which has carried it through. The greatest eloquence
ever displayed in the House has been employed to second the efforts
which have been made abroad. All this, however, leads but to one single
resolve. When this was done, all was done. I speak of absolute and
immediate abolition, the point which the first motions went to, and
which is in effect still pressed; though in this session, according to
order, it cannot take effect. A _remote_, and a _gradual_ abolition,
thoug