W. ROBERTSON, D. D-WARBURTON-DR. PRIMATT. between whom and the brutes, they hold, as it were, the middle place. But though this were true, it would not follow that we have a right either to debase ourselves by a habit of cruelty, or to use them ill; for even beasts, if inoffensive, are entitled to gentle treatment, and we have reason to believe that they who are not merciful will not obtain mercy. The same sentiments are found in Pliny and Columella, who both impute the decay of husbandry, in their time, not to any deficiency in the soil, but to the unwise policy of leaving to the management of slaves those fields, which, says Pliny, "had formerly rejoiced under the laurelled ploughshare and the triumphant ploughman," Rollin, with good reason, imputes to the same cause the present barrenness of Palestine, which in ancient times was called the land flowing with milk and honey.-Elements of Moral Science. WILLIAM ROBERTSON, D. D. In the ancient world.... the pers ns, the goods, the children of these slaves, were the property of their masters, disposed of at pleasure, and transferred, like any other possession, from one hand to another. No inequality, no superiority in power, no pretext of consent can justify this ignomonious depression of nature or can confer upon one man the right of dcn over another. Put not only doth reason condemn tussutution as rigst extenonce proved it to be pernicious both to masters anu slaves. The elevation of the former inspired them with pride, insolence, impatience, cruelty, and voluptuousness; the dependant and hopeless state of the latter dejected the human mind, and extinguis.eu every generous and noble principle in the heart.-Sermon. BISHOP WARBURTON, es "From the free savages I now come to the savages in bonds. By these I mean the vast multitudes yearly stolen from the opposite continent, and sacrificed by the colonists to their great idol the god of gain. But what, then, say these sincere worshippers of mammon ! They are our own property which we offer up. Gracious God! 'o talk, as of herds of cattle, of property in rational creatures, crea endued with all our faculties, possessing all our qualities but tot of color, our brethren both by nature and grace, shocks all the tectings of humanity, and the dictates of common sense! But, a's! what is there, in the infinite abuses of society, which does not sck them? Yet nothing is more certain in itself and apparent to a man that the infamous traffic for slaves directly infringes both ine and hoan law. Nature created man free, and grace invites him to assert mis freedom.-Sermon, 1776. DR. PRIMATT. It has pleased God to cover some men with white sus, and others with black; but as there is neither merit nor demo" in complen, the white man, notwithstanding the barbarity of custom and dice can have no right by virtue of his color to enslave and tyrannize over the black man. For whether a man be white or black, such he is by God's appointment, and, abstractly considered, is neither a subject for pride, nor an object of contempt.-Dissertation on the Duty of Mercy, and on the Sin of Cruelty to Brute Animals. DR. PECKARD. "Now, whether we consider the crime with respect to the individuals concerned in this most barbarous and cruel traffic, or whether we consider it as patronised and encouraged by the laws of the land, it presents to our view an equal degree of enormity. A crime, founded on a dreadful pre-eminence in wickedness; a crime which being both of individuals and the nation, must some time draw down upon us the heaviest judgment of Almighty God, who made of one blood all the sons of men, and who gave to all equally a natural right to liberty; and who, ruling all the kingdoms of the earth with equal providential justice, cannot suffer such deliberate, such monstrous iniquity, to pass long unpunished.”—Sermon before the Cambridge University. JOHN WESLEY. That execrable sum of all villanies commonly called the slave-trade. I read of nothing like it in the heathen world, whether ancient or modern. It infinitely exceeds every instance of barbarity, whatever Christian slaves suffer in Mohammedan countries.-His works, Vol. 3, page 341. At Liverpool, many large ships are now laid up in the docks, which had been employed for many years in buying or stealing Africans, and selling them in America for slaves. The men-butchers have now nothing to do at this laudable occupation. Since the American war broke out, there is no demand for human cattle; so the men of Africa, as well as Europe, may enjoy their native liberty.-Journal of April, 1777. THOUGHTS ON SLAVERY. 1. Slavery imports an obligation of perpetual service; an obligation which only the consent of the master can dissolve. It generally gives the master an arbitrary power of any correction not affecting life or limb. Sometimes even those are exposed to his will, or protected only by a fine or some slight punishment, too inconsiderable to restrain a master of harsh temper. It creates an incapacity of acquiring any thing, except for the master's benefit. It allows the master to alienate the slave in the same manner as his cows and horses. Lastly, it descends in its full extent, from parent to child, even to the last generation. 2. The grand plea is, "They are authorized by law." But can law, human law, change the nature of things? Can it turn darkness into light, or evil into good? By no means. Notwithstanding ten thousand laws, right is right, and wrong is wrong. There must still remain an essential difference between justice and injustice, cruelty and mercy. So that I ask; Who can reconcile this treatment of the slaves, first and last, with either mercy or justice; where is the justice of inflicting the severest evils on those who have done us no wrong? Of depriving those who never injured us in word or deed, of every comfort of life? Of tearing them from their native country, and depriving them of liberty itself; to which an Angolan has the same natural right as an American, and on which he sets as high a value? Where is the justice of taking away the lives of innocent, inoffensive men? Murdering thousands of them in their own land by the hands of their own countrymen; and tens of thousands in that cruel slavery, to which they are so unjustly reduced? "When we have slaves, it is necessary to use them with severity." What, to whip them for every petty offence till they are in a gore of blood? To take that opportunity of rubbing pepper and salt into their raw flesh? To drop burning sealing-wax upon their skins? To castrate them? To cut off half their foot with an axe ? To hang them on gibbets, that they may die by inches with heat, and hunger, and thirst? To pin them down to the ground, and then burn them by degrees from the feet to the head? To roast them alive? When did a Turk or a heathen find it necessary to use a fellow-creature thus? To what end is this usage necessary? "To prevent their running away, and to keep them constantly to their labor, that they may not idle away their time. So miserably stupid is this race of men, so stubborn and so wicked!" Allowing this, to whom is that stupidity owing? It lies altogether at the door of their inhuman masters, who gave them no means, no opportunity of improving their understanding; and indeed leave them no motive, either from hope or fear to attempt any such thing. They were no way remarkable for stupidity while they remained in Africa. To some of the inhabitants of Europe they are greatly superior. Survey the natives of Benin, and of Lapland, Compare the Samoeids and the Angolans. The African is in no respect inferior to the European. Their stupidity in our colonies is not natural; otherwise than it is the natural effect of their condition. Consequently it is not their fault, but yours: and you must answer for it before God and man. "But their stupidity is not the only reason of our treating them with severity; for it is hard to say which is the greatest, this, or their stubbornness, and wickedness." But do not these, as well as the other, lie at your door? Are not stubbornness, cunning, pilfering, and divers other vices, the natural necessary fruits of slavery, in every age and nation? What means have you used to remove this stubbornness? Have you tried what mildness and gentleness would do? What pains have you taken, what method have you used to reclaim them from their wickedness? O thou God of love, thou who art loving to every man, and whose mercy is over all thy works; thou who art the Father of the spirits of all flesh, and who art rich in mercy unto all; thou who hast formed of one blood, all the nations upon the earth; have compassion upon these outcasts of men, who are trodden down as dung upon the earth! Arise, and help these that have no helper, whose blood is spilled upon the ground like water! Are not these also the work of thine own hands, the purchase of thy Son's blood? Stir them up to cry unto thee in the land of their captivity; and let their complaint come up before thee; let it enter into thine ears! Make even those that lead them captive to pity them and turn their captivity. O burst thou all their chains in sunder; more especially the chains of their sins; thou Saviour of all, make them free, that they may be free indeed! ADAM CLARKE. Isaiah lviii, 6.-Let the oppressed go free. How can any nation pretend to fast, or worship God at all, or dare profess that they believe in the existence of such a Being, while they carry on what is called the slave-trade: and traffic in the souls, blood, and bodies of men! O ye most flagitious of knaves and worst of hypocrites! cast off at once the mask of religion, and deepen not your endless perdition by professing the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, while you continue in this traffic! THOMAS SCOTT. Exodus xxi, 16.-"He that stealeth a man, and selleth him, or if he be found in his hands, he shall surely be put to death." Stealing a man in order to sell him for a slave, whether the thief had actually sold him, or whether he continued in his possession. He who stole any one of the human family, in order to make a slave of him, should be punished with death. The crime would be aggravated by sending them away into foreign countries to be slaves to idolaters. Deuteronomy xxiv, 7.-"If a man be found stealing any of his brethren of the children of Israel, and maketh merchandise of him, or selleth him, then THAT THIEF SHALL DIE."-Every man is now our brother, whatever be his nation, complexion or creed. How then can the merchandise of men and women be carried on, without transgressing this commandment, or abetting those who do? A man may steal, or purchase of those who do steal, hundreds of men and women, and not only escape with impunity, but grow great like a prince. According to the law of God, whoever stole cattle restored four or five fold; whoever stole one human being, though an infant or an idiot, must die. 1. Timothy i, 10.-" Men-stealers."-Men-stealers are inserted among those daring criminals against whom the law of God directed its awful curses. Persons who kidnapped men to sell them for slaves. This practice seems inseparable from the other iniquities and oppressions of slavery; nor can a slave-dealer by any means keep free from that atrocious criminality, if the receiver be as bad as the thief. They who encourage that unchristian traffic by purchasing that, which is thus unjustly acquired, are partakers of their crimes.-MACKNIGHT.— That is the only species of theft which is punished with death by the laws of God. James ii, 12, 13.-"So speak ye, and so do, as they that shall be judged by the law of liberty. "For he shall have judgment without mercy that hath showed no mercy, and mercy rejoiceth against judgment." On this verse Dr. Scott makes the following remarks—" All who are not taught to show mercy to others, must expect to be dealt with according to the severity of justice in respect to their eternal state. What then must be the doom of the cruel oppressors and iniquitous tyrants of the human species? But the hard-hearted, selfish, implacable, and oppressive pro-> fessor of Christianity, has the greatest cause to tremble; for if 'he shall have judgment without mercy, who hath shown no mercy,' the meanest slave that ever was whipt and worked to death, must be considered as happy, compared with his haughty cruel tyrant, and this shall sufficiently appear, when the earth shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain."" Revelation xviii, 13.—" Slaves and souls of men."-Not only slaves, but the souls of men are mentioned as articles of commerce, which is beyond comparison, the most infamous of all traffics that the demon of avarice ever devised; almost infinitely more atrocious, than the accursed slave-trade. Alas! too often, injustice, oppression, fraud, avarice, or excessive indulgence are connected with extensive commerce; and to number the persons of men, with oxen, asses, sheep and horses, as the stock of a farm, or with bales of goods, as the cargo of a ship, is no doubt a most detestable and anti-christian practice.-Scott's Commentaries on the Bible. SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. We have offended, Oh! my countrymen ! Sibylline Leaves. There are truths so self-evident, or so immediately and palpably deduced from those that are, or are acknowledged for such, that they are at once intelligible to all men who possess the common advantages of the social state; although by sophistry, by evil habit, by the neglect, false persuasions and impostures of an Anti-Christian priesthood joined in one conspiracy with the violence of tyrannical governors, the understandings of men have become so darkened and their consciences so lethargic, that there may arise a necessity for the republication of these truths, and this too with a voice of loud alarm and impassioned warning. Such were the doctrines proclaimed by the first christians to the pagan world; such were the lightnings flashed by Wickliff, Huss, Luther, Calvin, Zuinglius, Latimer, &c., across the papal darkness, and such in our time the truths with which Thomas Clarkson, and his excellent confederates, the Quakers, fought and conquered the legalized banditti of men-stealers, the numerous and |