CHAP. I.

I AM fully convinced, that such a publication as this will meet violent opposition in the minds of many who are bound more by interest than justice or humanity; and if a man betray no signs of flagrant injustice in his com­mon dealings among the red of mankind, with respect to pecuniary matters, be is generally cryed up for an honest man, a man of unspotted reputation &c. but we are too apt to look over his conduct, as it relates to the poor ig­norant African, groaning under the yoke which he has laid upon him, and that any particular description of mankind whether of one, or another stature or [...]our, were intended, by the great Creator of all, to be herd in a state of abject and cringing dependance upon men of any description, is a doctrine, which I never could see into, either from motives of religion, morality, reason or policy. ^* My intention is to lay national affairs entirely aside, and [Page 6] consider the two extremes, of Despotism and Slavery, as they apply to individuals only.

In order to come at the truth of any matter, it is often improper to take it up in that state, in which we find it, as coming through a number of hands; the real state of the case may be obscured by falsehood and deceit, and it is therefore necessary to investigate the subject to the very source, by which means it is more than probable we may come at the true state of the case. That it has been custo­mary in all ages and countries, since the earth has been tolerably inhabited, to keep slaves, is a truth, which, though it cannot be denied, yet it ought to be lamented for the past and avoided for the future; and in the first settlement of the world after the deluge, there being little or no government among mankind, to restrain the strong and turbulant, and protect the weak and more peaceable, it is no wonder if a few ruffians of one neighbourhood, depending more upon their own strength, than any regard to justice, should go to another, pillage the place, and carry off not only the spoils, but oftentimes the children of the helpless inhabitants; which children, being kept continually as slaves, and brought up in that state, hav­ing no idea of any other situation of life, became recon­ciled to it, and appeared no way anxious about changing their station; but however reconciled a man may be to a state of slavery, or however satisfied with his lot he may appear in the eyes of the world to be, yet all this does not alter the fraud of the principle on the part of the con­queror or master. It is in the above manner that slavery has crept in upon mankind by degrees, and been handed down from generation to generation, until it has arrived at the present period, in which it is continued and support­ed in a more criminal extent than has ever before been equalled in the annals of the world; and that it was customary in the first age after the deluge, for the con­querors to make slaves or captives of the conquered, can easily be proved to the satisfaction of any one who believes in the old testament, in the case of the Sodomites being [Page 7] carried away captive, by Chedalaomer, king of the Ela­mites or Persians, after he had defeated them; and we also read, that Abraham hearing of this defeat of the Sodo­mites, and that his nephew's lot was among the captives, armed his own servants to the number of three hundred and eighteen, and pursuing the conquerors, overtook them, attacked them and defeated them, recovering all the spoils which they had taken, together with the men of Sodom. As we do not read that Abraham ever went to war, either before or after this expedition, it is plain that he could not have got these servants by conquest; and therefore must have got them by some other means; and the most probable presumption is that he bought them from some of the neighbouring conquerors, who either having enough others, or thinking it unsafe to keep too many among themselves, least they might attempt to re­gain their liberty, or perhaps in order to enable them the better to carry on their depredations, fell into the method of selling them to those who would give the highest price for them. ^*

As I have before stated, the avowed object of this publication, is to prove in a satisfactory manner the fraud and unreasonableness of the present system of slavery, as it applies to the unhappy Africans; not only as it relates to bringing an additional number into the country, but also as it relates to those already here; and it is con­tended by many of the advocates for this inhuman traffic, that "the Africans are the seed of Cain, and that the mark which the great Creator set upon their forefather, was to change his colour from white to black, and that this colour was to follow his posterity as long as the [Page 8] world stands, and that slavery was to be their unalterable lot, during that time." To this I reply, that the mark set upon Cain, as far as I can discover from the bible, was no other than a distinction of him from the rest of mankind, in order that no one should lay violent hands upon him and slay him; for it evidently appears to me that God intended to punish him while here upon earth by those stings of conscience, which guilt, and the merited contempt of the rest of mankind, never sail to bring upon the wretch who is so unfortunate as to deserve them; nei­ther can we form any probable opinion, whether the mark set upon Cain, was any change in his colour or not; it might have been a crop of the ear, or a thousand other things, as well as a change of his colour; but admitting that his colour was changed, it might as well have been purple, green, yellow, &c. as black; and the black people might as well contend that before that time, all men were black, and that Cain was made white; and still have as good grounds to argue upon, as the advocates for slavery have, when they say that Cain was made black; for I do not recollect any passage in the bible that says what was Adam or Eve's colour, and add to this, we cannot find any passage to justify an opinion, that any of Cain's seed were in the ark; and if there were, it must have come from the wives of some one or more of the Patriarchs, or have been the wife of some one or other of Noah's sons. As the Chronology in the male line is brought down from Adam, by which it plainly appears that all the males who were in the ark, were descended from Seth, the third son of Adam; and as we read, and have every reason to be­lieve, that the descendants of Seth held no intercourse with those of Cain, it amounts almost to positive proof that Cain's posterity were all cut off by the deluge. ^* But ad­mitting [Page 9] for argument sake, that the wives of Noah's sons, were entirly of the blood of Cain, it would then follow, of course, that their posterity (being of the seed of Cain on the one side, and that of Seth on the other) they would be the equal descendants of both those ancestors; and therefore it would be impossible to distinguish between them, which was to be considered as the posterity of the one, and which the posterity of the other; and for in­stance, suppose Cain's posterity (according to the argu­ments, or rather assertions, of the advocates of slavery) to have been black, and the posterity of Seth to have been white, by the intermarriage of Noah's sons with women descended from Cain, and according to the course of na­ture, their children must have been between black and white, or in other words, what we term mulattoes; and those children having no other colour to intermarry with, would never to the present generation have varied their colour (except according to the intense heat of some, and cold of other climates) nor as I have just observed, would it be possible for any one of them to convince the other, that he was the person alluded to in God's setting a mark upon Cain, and must therefore be his servant; as the other would have full as good a foundation to retort it upon the first, and say that he was the seed of Cain, and thus would mankind be eternally sheding the blood of man in vain, without a possibility of ever arriving at the right of the story.

As for my own part I cannot conceive that the Creator ever intended to put such a stumbling block in the way of mankind, much less how could we (at the distance of up­wards of four thousand years after the flood) pretend to say, "this or that man is one of Cain's posterity; and I being one of the descendants of Seth, am his right and [Page 10] lawful master." And again, admitting the wife of one of Noah's sons only to have been a descendant of Cain, and that the distinction could easily be made between the poste­rity of the one and the posterity of the other two; it is hold­ing up an idea the most derogatory to the justice of the great Creator, to suppose he would be guilty (not only of injustice but of double injustice) first, to inflict a heri­ditary punishment upon one man and his posterity, where­by thousands, or perhaps millions of innocent persons must suffer in an abject state of slavery, for the guilt of one man who had sinned; and secondly, that his revenge not being satiated upon the first, that he should blend the seed of the innocent with that of the guilty, and deal out the bitter cup of slavery and disgrace to their posterity to the end of time. And I believe the Almighty (to use the language of Mr. Paine) to be too just to do any such a thing, and too Almighty to be driven to the necessity of doing it. I never can be brought over to join a doc­trine that requires me to have so mean an opinion of my Creator, especially when it rests on so slender a founda­tion.

By what I have said, I trust I shall remove the belief of the Africans now among us, being the descendants of Cain, from the mind of every person who shall see this work, unless he be a person who, lost to every sentiment of humanity or benevolence, seeks only to hoard up riches at the expence of injured humanity, and by stifling reason, morality, and every generous sentiment of the human heart to carry his favorite design into execution.

CHAP. II.

HAVING in the foregoing chapter offered my rea­sons for supposing that the present generation of Africans, are not the descendants of Cain; I propose in the present one, to investigate this matter a little further; hoping that I shall sufficiently prove at all events, that the slave-trade is both unreasonable and unjust. It is said, by another class of the advocates for the slave-trade, that "they are descended from Canaan, the son of Ham, and grand-son of Noah, and that they lay under this curse for the sin which Canaan's father (Ham) committed by making sport of Noah when he was drunk in his tent;" and that the Africans are descended from Ham, is ex­ceedingly probable, both from scripture, and history. ^* But what can be the reason that the curse is only in part put in execution (in that there are millions of Africans still at liberty, and consequently not fulfilling the sentence passed upon them) I am totally at a loss to account for. Besides, it appears from the bible, that Noah had been drunk but just before he passed the sentence upon Canaan; and it does not appear to me, that a man who had just been laying dormant the powers of reason, the greatest blessing that God has given to man, was at that time a fit judge to pronounce sentence upon a man who had of­fended him, and much less against the son who was inno­cent of what the father had done.

But what does the sentence amount to? is it any tem­porary punishment which was to be inflicted upon Canaan, for what his father had done? No—it was to lay his whole offspring under the curse of slavery, for a fault committed by his father, of which he was innocent, and [Page 12] which (it is not probable) was a greater fault than that committed by Noah himself, in getting drunk: in short, Noah seems by the reading of the passage, to have been over-ruled by his passion, at the time of his cursing his grand-son; and whether or not this may be the case, I cannot find from scripture or reason, whence he derived his authority to curse him; or the power to give efficacy to his denunciations after they were made. Neither does it appear to me, to correspond with divine or moral justice or mercy, that the son should be made liable for the sins of the father; much less, that his posterity for four thou­sand years, should continue slaves for the expiation of his guilt; and add to all this, that one of the prophets has said (and we are told that it is blasphemy to disbelieve them) no longer should the proverb be used ^* "that the fathers have eaten four grapes, and the children's teeth been set on edge." From whence I infer that man is to be accountable for his own actions only, and indeed the sequel of the chapter plainly demonstrates it to be so.

But supposing Noah to have been in a perfect and un­disturbed state of mind at the time of his cursing his grand­son, I cannot see how that curse ought to effect him or his posterity, and how many daily instances do we see of men cursing their brothers, children, &c. and yet we do not see that those curses have any effect whatsoever; ex­cept such as may be produced by the influence of the curser among men, ^† and I should rather take it for an example of the folly of such imprecations, than any prin­ciple that ought to awe a child into an undue obedience of an unjust and unreasonable command, of a sordid pa­rent; and in a word, I dispute the right of Noah or any other man that ever lived, to curse his offspring yet un­born, thereby entailing slavery upon them. My father had no right to curse me, and if he had done it, it would not have had any bad effect upon me: I have no right to [Page 13] curse my offspring, neither had Noah, or any other man, a right which was not also applicable to every other man.

To sum up the whole—If Noah had a right to curse his grand-son and his posterity, it certainly admits, that every other man had a right to do the same with respect to their grand-sons &c. and according to that doctrine, we should soon have the whole human race cursed into slave­ry, for some real or supposed misdemeanor, and none left for masters, to lord it over them. A thing, that is inconsistent in itself, and morally impossible.

From these considerations, I am fully convinced, that the sentence passed upon Canaan has nothing at all to do with the present state of slavery, into which the unhappy Africans are plunged.

I shall therefore proceed to offer a few other remarks, in order to shew, as far as I am capable, the absurdity of this hateful traffic of human flesh and blood.

CHAP III.

HAVING mentioned two principle points on which the advocates for the slave-trade place their dependence, and having offered my reasons for viewing the subject in a different light, I shall next proceed to state a third asser­tion of their's, and endeavour to confute it as well as I can both from scripture and reason. They say that the colour, hair, &c. of the Africans, is different from that of a white man, and that these differences are sufficient evidences that the Almighty intended them for slaves. What an absurd argument is this! to say that he who knows no difference between man and man, should have such a par­tiality for this, that, or the other colour; or if he had, might we not as reasonably expect him to be partial to the blacks as the whites; or to the tawny coloured Indian as either?

Reader, if you believe in the old or new testament, you may find many passages in them which altogether con­demn the practice of making slaves of our fellow creatures; and that they are our fellow-creatures cannot be denied; they have a rational mind, if properly cultivated; many of them are persons of bright talents, but for the most part, those talents are lost to mankind for want of proper culti­vation and encouragement.

Jesus Christ says, that the first, and great command­ment is "thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy mind, with all thy soul, and with all thy strength;" and that the second is like unto it, namely, "thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." In the first place then search the new testament, and you will find it possitively proved, that every man breathing is our neighbour, according to the doctrine of the aforementioned great philanthropist, who had the most unbounded compassion for all men, and was a great lover of mercy. That the Africans are men, I presume the most barefaced person in America, will not pretend to deny; it therefore results, from these proofs, [Page 15] first, that the Africans are men, and secondly, that all mankind are our neighbours; that the keepers of slaves are guilty of a breach of the commandment that is the second one in magnitude; and as long as that sin is left unrepented of, he can never enter the kingdom of heaven (according to the Christian religion) and if it is repented of, and the cause not removed, it is just leaving the same thing to be repented of again at a future day. It is as if a thief having repented of his former actions, continues the same course of life saying, that he could repent of his future actions at a future time. ^* Again—Jesus Christ says, do injustice to no man; how can a follower of his reconcile these passages to his own conduct, in keeping his brother a slave? If a man has wrought hard, and earned a sum of money, is it just that another should come, and take it away from him? I presume that every man of reason will say not; if this is not justice, neither is it just to withhold from him, that time in which, by his industry he may acquire that money, whether it be more or less.

Then if Jesus Christ has commanded his followers to do injustice to no man, and on a careful examination, a man finds that he is oppressing his neighbour (perhaps the widow, or the orphan) and consequently doing injus­tice to some person, I say, how ill do that man's actions accord with the professions of his lips, or with the amiable conduct of him whom they pretend to follow, who never injured a man in his life, much less, enslaved him. It is further said, by the same person (Jesus Christ) in com­paring men to servants of a great man, who went a long journey, that one of the servants got drunk and began to beat and abuse the other servants in his lord's absence, and that he was punished severely for it at his lord's re­turn. From this I draw an inference, that the Almighty [Page 16] is the Lord there spoken of, and that men are the servants; and that they are to be called to account hereafter for their actions; if so, what must be the situation of many who having enslaved their fellow servants, abuse them without mercy? in short, their conduct is diametrically opposite to the mild and philanthropic doctrine taught by Jesus Christ.

We come next to take a view of the manner of procur­ing slaves in Africa. This is done in a variety of ways; first, two nations being at war with each other, the poor wretches who are so unfortunate as to be taken prisoners, are sold by the captain to the first good bidder. Secondly, I am told, that their princes exercise a despotic sway over them, by which, they will sell hundreds annually to all countries that want them. Thirdly, for any offence committed against their laws, or rather barbarous and ar­bitrary customs, the king will sell them which bears some affinity to the British government, sending their (pretended) offenders to Botany-Bay; only with this difference, that the latter send them for a certain term, whereas the former send them not only during life, but for generations yet unborn. Fourthly, if any man owes a debt which he is unable to pay, the creditor seizes upon the first of the debtor's family that falls in his way; sells him, or her at the next sea-port town, to the best bidder; and thus en­tails slavery upon a man's posterity, on account of a trifling debt, which perhaps a few days labour would discharge; and fifthly, the officers and crews of ships, often kidknap the innocent creatures, particularly children, in the woods and along the sea coast. There may be many other methods of obtaining them, but these are the chief with which I am acquainted.

Let me ask any man of common sense or reason, if he can find the man innocent who having been in the British or French service, and having taken a prisoner, has sold him to an American; or would not the purchaser be equ­ally guilty with the seller? certainly he would, if he knew that the seller came dishonestly by that property which he [Page 17] sold to him; and certainly no man can come so honestly by another man, as to be authorized to make sale of him, as of a horse or a cow. In the like manner let him take any of the other cases that I have mentioned, and consider what ought to be done with the man who has been guilty of one of these means of oppressing his neighbour. In a word, let any man of reason or candour (I care not whe­ther he is a religious man or not) take the matter home to himself, and say how he would relish to have his wife and children, or either of them, or perhaps, his brother or sister, torn away from him and dragged to a foreign country, he knows not where, nor how to be used. Let him contemplate the wife of his bosom, or a beloved sister, laboring in the open field with little or no cloathing to keep them decent, or guard them from the inclemency of the weather; with an unmerciful wretch of a driver, who knows no more of humanity than a tyger or a panther, to abuse them on every frivolous occasion; and let him fol­low them from the field to the wretched hut, in which they spend their melancholy nights; and view them with a scanty morsel of miserable food, scarce sufficient to keep nature alive. Having brought his imagination to this point, let him lay his hand upon his heart, and in the presence of him who made man, say whether or not this is justice, mercy, reason, or religion. If he cannot give it his ap­probation, when it applies to himself or his connections▪ neither ought he when it applies to others, for that would not be doing what he would wish to have done to him­self. I am not, as many may think I am, for setting the Africans free immediately, in that state of ignorance and darkness in which they have been gropeing this long time. But I shall, in the ensuing chapter, give some hints of a plan, which I have engendered in my own mind, for setting them all free in time, and making worthy citizens of them. Permit me reader, to ask you one question; suppose yourself taken by any means whatever, and carried into a foreign country, and there used as many of the Afri­cans are here; would you hold any attempt too hazard­ous [Page 18] to regain your liberty and return to your country and friends? certainly not; why then condemn another man for that which in yourself you would esteem the greatest virtue in your composition, the love of liberty? If you do, you act contrary to that sublime and glorious principle, "do as you would wish to be done by." A few words more, and I will close this chapter. At the time when the American war commenced, it was declared that all men were born, and of right ought to be free; and this prin­ciple was held up as the creed of nine tenths of the peo­ple in America. Let him then, who fought for liberty upon those principles, and he who has any thing to say in praise of the glorious Fourth of July, 1776, remember that he is acting diametrically opposite to those principles, provided he keeps either man, woman, or child in slavery.

CHAP. IV.

IN the former part of this work, I have endeavoured to convince all men of the injustice and unreasonableness of keeping slaves. I come now to suggest a plan for set­ting them free: with regard to this, people may differ greatly, it being a matter of great magnitude; for my own part, I shall only attempt to drop a few hints on the subject. To set all the slaves in America free at once, in their present ignorant state of mind, would be fraught with great danger to the community at large; and still more so to individuals. The plan therefore which I would recommend is this; that every person having a slave, from ten years old, and younger, or that may be born hereafter, be obliged to register the name and also the time and place of birth of the said slave, in an office to be kept in each district for that purpose. And let each such person be obliged upon penalty of forfeiting the sum of —to teach or cause to be taught, to the said slave, [Page 19] the arts of reading and writing by the time he or she shall have attained the age of fifteen years. By this means, they may be snatched from ignorance and superstition, and the way fairly paved for making good citizens of them when they come to be set free, which might be fixed at the age of one or two and twenty; during which time, they ought not to be allowed to be taken out of one state into another, least they should at last be cheated out of their freedom. Perhaps some people may ridicule the idea of setting the Africans free, because they are interest­ed in keeping them slaves; but every man who has the feeling of a man, must acknowledge, that though the keeping of slaves has acquired the sanction of custom, yet it is unjust in the strictest sense of the word. Hence I am inclined to hope that my proposition, after receiving amendments, from abler pens, may meet the ideas of most people who are generally agreed that it is not right to keep them, but disagree as to the method of set­ting them at liberty. If I have offended any man, by the open manner in which I have spoken of this infamous traffic, I would not have him blame me for speaking my sentiments upon the subject; but rather blame himself for his imprudence in leaving a door open to censure. Con­sider man (whoever thou art, that enslavest thy fellow creature) that it would be far better for thee to take pro­per measures in hand for setting him free at a convenient time, than by tyrannizing over him all the days of his life; to make him thy enemy and perhaps put thy life in danger from his thirst for revenge; and above all, render thyself obnoxious to the great Creator, who is thy master. If the Africans were free, the country would receive a great addition to its present strength; because every one of this hardy race of people, who had by their industry ac­quired a property, though ever so little, would no doubt stand in defence of it; whereas, at present they have no­thing for which it is worth their while to venture their lives; for if a man is to be a slave all his life, what mat­ters it to him, whether his master is a Frenchman, an Englishman, or an American?

[Page 20]Lastly; I am no Quaker, I am no Methodist (no of­fence I hope to any who are) I am no discontented per­son, trying to disturb the public tranquillity; neither am I a man who ever had, or who ever intends to have a slave. I am, on the contrary, a man who would wish to maintain the Rights of Man, in the strictest sense of the word; who would wish to preserve the public tranquillity, and prevent it from being disturbed, while we may, least we should one day witness such scenes as have recently been witnessed at St. Domingo, &c. I am a man who as far as I can avoid, does nothing to any man which I would be unwilling that man should do to me.

The late decree of the National Convention of France, freeing all their negroes at once, is a great decree, and worthy the patriotic band who passed it; but for want of a little education being bestowed upon them in time, I fear they will be very disorderly during the present ge­neration; as many people pretend to say, that that decree was only passed upon political, and not upon moral prin­ciples; I shall only say, that it is immeterial what was the motive, so that it answers the grand object, that of restoring an injured people to their long lost rights.

I shall now quit the subject altogether, well persuaded that (however it may, or may not meet the approbation of my fellow-citizens) I have done my duty, and hoping that this small specimen of my poor abilities may meet their serious consideration.