acious God! to talk, as of herds of
cattle, of property in rational creatures, creatures endued with all our
faculties, possessing all our qualities but that of colour, our brethren
both by nature and grace, shocks all the feelings of humanity, and the
dictates of common sense! But, alas! what is there, in the infinite abuses
of society, which does not shock them? Yet nothing is more certain in
itself and apparent to all, than that the infamous traffic for slaves
directly infringes both divine and human law. Nature created man free, and
grace invites him to assert his freedom."

"In excuse of this violation it hath been pretended, that though indeed
these miserable outcasts of humanity be torn from their homes and native
country by fraud and violence, yet they thereby become the happier, and
their condition the more eligible. But who are you, who pretend to judge of
another man's happiness; that state, which each man under the guidance of
his Maker forms for himself, and not one man for another? To know what
constitutes mine or your happiness is the sole prerogative of him who
created us, and cast us in so various and different moulds. Did your slaves
ever complain to you of their unhappiness amidst their native woods and
deserts? or rather let me ask, Did they ever cease complaining of their
condition under you their lordly masters, where they see indeed the
accommodations of civil life, but see them all pass to others, themselves
unbenefited by them? Be so gracious then, ye petty tyrants over human
freedom, to let your slaves judge for themselves, what it is which makes
their own happiness, and then see whether they do not place it in the
return to their own country, rather than in the contemplation of your
grandeur, of which their misery makes so large a part; a return so
passionately longed for, that, despairing of happiness here, that is, of
escaping the chains of their cruel taskmasters, they console themselves
with feigning it to be the gracious reward of heaven, in their future
state"--

About this time certain cruel and wicked practices, which must now be
mentioned, had arrived at such a height, and had become so frequent in the
metropolis, as to produce of themselves other coadjutors to the cause.

Before the year 1700, planters, merchants, and others, resident in the West
Indies, but coming to England, were accustomed to bring with them certain
slaves to act as servants with them during their stay. The latte