ong the twenty-three in its favor were
Fox and Burke. During this same month the unwearied defender of our
country came forward again, declaring that he could not be "an adviser
or a well-wisher to any of the vindictive operations against America,
because the cause is unjust; but at the same time he must be equally
earnest to secure British interests from destruction," and he thus
prophesies:--

"The fate of America is cast. You may bruise its heel; but you cannot
crush its head. It will revive again. _The new world is before them.
Liberty is theirs._ They have possession of a free government, their
birthright and inheritance, derived to them from their parent state,
which the hand of violence cannot wrest from them. If you will cast them
off, my last wish is to them, May they go and prosper!"

Again, on the 10th May, 1776, he vindicated anew his original
proposition, and here again he testifies for peace and against slavery.

"For the sake of peace, therefore, I did propose a test of compromise by
an act of acceptance, on the part of the Colonists, of an act of
Parliament which should lay _the foundation for the extirpation of the
horrid custom of slavery in the New World_. My motion was simply an act
of compromise and reconciliation; and, as far as it was a legislative
act, it was still to have been applied in correcting the laws of slavery
in America, which I considered as repugnant to the laws of the realm of
England and to the fundamentals of our constitution. Such a compromise
would at the same time have saved the national honor."[75]

All gratitude to the hero who at this early day vowed himself to the
abolition of slavery. Hartley is among the first of abolitionists, with
hardly a predecessor except Granville Sharp, and in Parliament
absolutely the first. Clarkson was at this time fifteen years old,
Wilberforce sixteen. It was only in 1787 that Clarkson obtained the
prize for the best Latin essay on the question, "Is it right to make men
slaves against their will?" It was not until 1791 that Wilberforce moved
for leave to bring in a bill for the abolition of the slave-trade.
Surely it is a great honor for one man, that he should have come forward
in Parliament as an avowed abolitionist, while he was at the same time a
vindicator of our independence.

Again, on the 15th May, 1777, Hartley pleaded for us, saying:--

"At sea, which has hitherto been our prerogative element, they rise
against us at a stupendou