An Essay on the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species Part 15

The third advantage which they are said to experience, is that of _holy-days_, or days of respite from their usual discipline and fatigue. This is certainly a great indulgence, and ought to be recorded to the immortal honour of the _receivers_. We wish we could express their liberality in those handsome terms, in which it deserves to be represented, or applaud them sufficiently for deviating for once from the rigours of servile discipline. But we confess, that we are unequal to the task, and must therefore content ourselves with observing, that while the horse has _one_ day in _seven_ to refresh his limbs, the happy _African_[101] has but _one_ in _fifty-two_, as a relaxation from his labours.

With respect to their _dances_, on which such a particular stress has been generally laid, we fear that people may have been as shamefully deceived, as in the former instances. For from the manner in which these are generally mentioned, we should almost be led to imagine, that they had certain hours allowed them for the purpose of joining in the dance, and that they had every comfort and convenience, that people are generally supposed to enjoy on such convivial occasions. But this is far from the case. Reason informs us, that it can never be. If they wish for such innocent recreations, they must enjoy them in the time that is allotted them for sleep; and so far are these dances from proceeding from any uncommon degree of happiness, which excites them to convivial society, that they proceed rather from an uncommon depression of spirits, which makes them even sacrifice their rest[102], for the sake of experiencing for a moment a more joyful oblivion of their cares. For suppose any one of the _receivers_, in the middle of a dance, were to address his slaves in the following manner: "_Africans!_ I begin at last to feel for your situation; and my conscience is severely hurt, whenever I reflect that I have been reducing those to a state of misery and pain, who have never given me offence. You seem to be fond of these exercises, but yet you are obliged to take them at such unseasonable hours, that they impair your health, which is sufficiently broken by the intolerable share of labour which I have hitherto imposed upon you. I will therefore make you a proposal. Will you be content to live in the colonies, and you shall have the half of every week entirely to yourselves? or will you choose to return to your miserable, wretched country?"--But what is that which strikes their ears? Which makes them motionless in an instant? Which interrupts the festive scene?--their country?--transporting sound!--Behold! they are now flying from the dance: you may see them running to the sh.o.r.e, and, frantick as it were with joy, demanding with open arms an instantaneous pa.s.sage to their beloved native plains.

Such are the _colonial delights_, by the representation of which the _receivers_ would persuade us, that the _Africans_ are taken from their country to a region of conviviality and mirth; and that like those, who leave their usual places of residence for a summer's amus.e.m.e.nt, they are conveyed to the colonies--_to bathe_,--_to dance_,--_to keep holy-day_,--_to be jovial_.--But there is something so truly ridiculous in the attempt to impose these scenes of felicity on the publick, as scenes which fall to the lot of slaves, that the _receivers_ must have been driven to great extremities, to hazard them to the eye of censure.

The last point that remains to be considered, is the shameful a.s.sertion, that the _Africans_ are much _happier in the colonies, than in their own country_. But in what does this superiour happiness consist? In those real scenes, it must be replied, which have been just mentioned; for these, by the confession of the receivers, const.i.tute the happiness they enjoy.--But it has been shewn that these have been unfairly represented; and, were they realized in the most extensive lat.i.tude, they would not confirm the fact. For if, upon a recapitulation, it consists in the pleasure of _manumission_, they surely must have pa.s.sed their lives in a much more comfortable manner, who, like the _Africans at home_, have had no occasion for such a benefit at all. But the _receivers_, we presume, reason upon this principle, that we never know the value of a blessing but by its loss.

This is generally true: but would any one of them make himself a _slave_ for years, that he might run the chance of the pleasures of _manumission_? Or that he might taste the charms of liberty with _a greater relish_? Nor is the a.s.sertion less false in every other consideration. For if their happiness consists in the few _holy-days_, which _in the colonies_ they are permitted to enjoy, what must be their situation _in their own country_, where the whole year is but one continued holy-day, or cessation from discipline and fatigue?--If in the possession of _a mean and contracted spot_, what must be their situation, where a whole region is their own, producing almost spontaneously the comforts of life, and requiring for its cultivation none of those hours, which should be appropriated to _sleep_?--If in the pleasures of the _colonial dance_, what must it be in _their own country_, where they may dance for ever; where there is no stated hour to interrupt their felicity, no intolerable labour immediately to succeed their recreations, and no overseer to receive them under the discipline of the lash?--If these therefore are the only circ.u.mstances, by which the a.s.sertion can be proved, we may venture to say, without fear of opposition, that it can never be proved at all.

But these are not the only circ.u.mstances. It is said that they are barbarous at home.--But do you _receivers_ civilize them?--Your unwillingness to convert them to Christianity, because you suppose you must use them more kindly when converted, is but a bad argument in favour of the fact.

It is affirmed again, that their manner of life, and their situation is such in their own country, that to say they are happy is a jest. "But who are you, who pretend to judge[103] 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 const.i.tutes 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 desarts? 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 pa.s.s 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."

But since you speak with so much confidence on the subject, let us ask you _receivers_ again, if you have ever been informed by your unfortunate slaves, that they had no connexions in the country from which they have forcibly been torn away: or, if you will take upon you to a.s.sert, that they never sigh, when they are alone; or that they never relate to each other their tales of misery and woe. But you judge of them, perhaps, in an happy moment, when you are dealing out to them their provisions for the week; and are but little aware, that, though the countenance may be cheered with a momentary smile, the heart may be exquisitely tortured. Were you to shew us, indeed, that there are laws, subject to no evasion, by which you are obliged to clothe and feed them in a comfortable manner; were you to shew us that they are protected[104] at all; or that even _one_ in a _thousand_ of those masters have suffered death[105], who have been guilty of _premeditated_ murder to their slaves, you would have a better claim to our belief: but you can neither produce the instances nor the laws. The people, of whom you speak, are _slaves_, are your own _property_, are wholly _at your own disposal_; and this idea is sufficient to overturn your a.s.sertions of their happiness.

But we shall now mention a circ.u.mstance, which, in the present case, will have more weight than all the arguments which have hitherto been advanced. It is an opinion, which the _Africans_ universally entertain, that, as soon as death shall release them from the hands of their oppressors, they shall immediately be wafted back to their native plains, there to exist again, to enjoy the sight of their beloved countrymen, and to spend the whole of their new existence in scenes of tranquillity and delight; and so powerfully does this notion operate upon them, as to drive them frequently to the horrid extremity of putting a period to their lives. Now if these suicides are frequent, (which no person can deny) what are they but a proof, that the situation of those who destroy themselves must have been insupportably wretched: and if the thought of returning to their country after death, _when they have experienced the colonial joys_, const.i.tutes their supreme felicity, what are they but a proof, that they think there is as much difference between the two situations, as there is between misery and delight?

Nor is the a.s.sertion of the _receivers_ less liable to a refutation in the instance of those, who terminate their own existence, than of those, whom nature releases from their persecutions. They die with a smile upon their face, and their funerals are attended by a vast concourse of their countrymen, with every possible demonstration of joy[106]. But why this unusual mirth, if their departed brother has left an happy place? Or if he has been taken from the care of an indulgent master, who consulted his pleasures, and administered to his wants? But alas, it arises from hence, that _he is gone to his happy country_: a circ.u.mstance, sufficient of itself, to silence a myriad of those specious arguments, which the imagination has been racked, and will always be racked to produce, in favour of a system of tyranny and oppression.

It remains only, that we should now conclude the chapter with a fact, which will shew that the account, which we have given of the situation of slaves, is strictly true, and will refute at the same time all the arguments which have hitherto been, and may yet be brought by the _receivers_, to prove that their treatment is humane. In one of the western colonies of the Europeans, [107]six hundred and fifty thousand slaves were imported within an hundred years; at the expiration of which time, their whole posterity were found to amount to one hundred and forty thousand. This fact will ascertain the treatment of itself. For how shamefully must these unfortunate people have been oppressed? What a dreadful havock must famine, fatigue, and cruelty, have made among them, when we consider, that the descendants of _six hundred and fifty thousand_ people in the prime of life, gradually imported within a century, are less numerous than those, which only _ten thousand_[108]

would have produced in the same period, under common advantages, and in a country congenial to their const.i.tutions?

But the _receivers_ have probably great merit on the occasion. Let us therefore set it down to their humanity. Let us suppose for once, that this incredible waste of the human species proceeds from a benevolent design; that, sensible of the miseries of a servile state, they resolve to wear out, as fast as they possibly can, their unfortunate slaves, that their miseries may the sooner end, and that a wretched posterity may be prevented from sharing their parental condition. Now, whether this is the plan of reasoning which the _receivers_ adopt, we cannot take upon us to decide; but true it is, that the effect produced is exactly the same, as if they had reasoned wholly on this _benevolent_ principle.

FOOTNOTES

[Footnote 097: The articles of war are frequently read at the head of every regiment in the service, stating those particular actions which are to be considered as crimes.]

[Footnote 098: We cannot omit here to mention one of the customs, which has been often brought as a palliation of slavery, and which prevailed but a little time ago, and we are doubtful whether it does not prevail now, in the metropolis of this country, of kidnapping men for the service of the East-India Company. Every subject, as long as he behaves well, has a right to the protection of government; and the tacit permission of such a scene of iniquity, when it becomes known, is as much a breach of duty in government, as the conduct of those subjects, who, on other occasions, would be termed, and punished as, rebellious.]

[Footnote 099: The expences of every parish are defrayed by a poll-tax on negroes, to save which they pretend to liberate those who are past labour; but they still keep them employed in repairing fences, or in doing some trifling work on a scanty allowance. For to free a _field-negroe_, so long as he can work, is a maxim, which, notwithstanding the numerous boasted manumissions, no master _ever thinks of adopting_ in the colonies.]

[Footnote 100: They must be cultivated always on a _Sunday_, and frequently in those hours which should be appropriated to _sleep_, or the wretched possessors must be inevitably _starved_.]

[Footnote 101: They are allowed in general three holy-days at Christmas, but in Jamaica they have two also at Easter, and two at Whitsuntide: so that on the largest scale, they have only seven days in a year, or one day in fifty-two. But this is on a supposition, that the receivers do not break in upon the afternoons, which they are frequently too apt to do. If it should be said that Sunday is an holy-day, it is not true; it is so far an holy-day, that they do not work for their masters; but such an holy-day, that if they do not employ it in the cultivation of their little spots, they must _starved_.]

[Footnote 102: These dances are usually in the middle of the night; and so desirous are these unfortunate people of obtaining but a joyful hour, that they not only often give up their sleep, but add to the labours of the day, by going several miles to obtain it.]

[Footnote 103: Bishop of Glocester's sermon, preached before the society for the propagation of the gospel, at the anniversary meeting, on the 21st of February, 1766.]

[Footnote 104: There is a law, (but let the reader remark, that it prevails but in _one_ of the colonies), against mutilation. It took its rise from the frequency of the inhuman practice. But though a master cannot there chop off the limb of a slave with an axe, he may yet work, starve, and beat him to death with impunity.]

[Footnote 105: _Two_ instances are recorded by the _receivers_, out of about _fifty-thousand_, where a white man has suffered death for the murder of a negroe; but the receivers do not tell us, that these suffered more because they were the pests of society, than because the _murder of slaves was a crime_.]

[Footnote 106: A negroe-funeral is considered as a curious sight, and is attended with singing, dancing, musick, and every circ.u.mstance that can shew the attendants to be happy on the occasion.]

[Footnote 107: In 96 years, ending in 1774, 800,000 slaves had been imported into the French part of St. Domingo, of which there remained only 290,000 in 1774. Of this last number only 140,000 were creoles, or natives of the island, i. e. of 650,000 slaves, the whole posterity were 140,000. _Considerations sur la Colonie de St. Dominique_,(See errata--should be read as "_St. Domingue_") published by authority in 1777.]

[Footnote 108: Ten thousand people under fair advantages, and in a soil congenial to their const.i.tutions, and where the means of subsistence are easy, should produce in a century 160,000. This is the proportion in which the Americans increased; and the Africans in their own country increase in the same, if not in a greater proportion. Now as the climate of the colonies is as favourable to their health as that of their own country, the causes of the prodigious decrease in the one, and increase in the other, will be more conspicuous.]

CHAP. X.

We have now taken a survey of the treatment which the unfortunate _Africans_ undergo, when they are put into the hands of the _receivers_. This treatment, by the four first chapters of the present part of this Essay, appears to be wholly insupportable, and to be such as no human being can apply to another, without the imputation of such crimes, as should make him tremble. But as many arguments are usually advanced by those who have any interest in the practice, by which they would either exculpate the treatment, or diminish its severity, we allotted the remaining chapters for their discussion. In these we considered the probability of such a treatment against the motives of interest; the credit that was to be given to those disinterested writers on the subject, who have recorded particular instances of barbarity; the inferiority of the _Africans_ to the human species; the comparisons that are generally made with respect to their situation; the positive scenes of felicity which they are said to enjoy, and every other argument, in short, that we have found to have ever been advanced in the defence of slavery. These have been all considered, and we may venture to p.r.o.nounce, that, instead of answering the purpose for which they were intended, they serve only to bring such circ.u.mstances to light, as clearly shew, that if ingenuity were racked to invent a situation, that would be the most distressing and insupportable to the human race; it could never invent one, that would suit the description better, than the--_colonial slavery_.

If this then be the case, and if slaves, notwithstanding all the arguments to the contrary, are exquisitely miserable, we ask you _receivers, by what right_ you reduce them to so wretched a situation?

You reply, that you _buy them_; that your _money_ const.i.tutes your _right_, and that, like all other things which you purchase, they are wholly at your own disposal.

Upon this principle alone it was, that we professed to view your treatment, or examine your right, when we said, that "the question[109]

resolved itself into two separate parts for discussion; into the _African_ commerce, as explained in the history of slavery, and the subsequent slavery in the colonies, _as founded on the equity of the commerce_." Now, since it appears that this commerce, upon the fullest investigation, is contrary to "_the principles[110] of law and government, the dictates of reason, the common maxims of equity, the laws of nature, the admonitions of conscience, and, in short, the whole doctrine of natural religion_," it is evident that the _right_, which is founded upon it, must be the same; and that if those things only are lawful in the sight of G.o.d, which are either virtuous in themselves, or proceed from virtuous principles, you _have no right over them at all_.

You yourselves also confess this. For when we ask you, whether any human being has a right to sell you, you immediately answer, No; as if nature revolted at the thought, and as if it was so contradictory to your own feelings, as not to require consideration. But who are you, that have this exclusive charter of trading in the liberties of mankind? When did nature, or rather the Author of nature, make so partial a distinction between you and them? When did He say, that you should have the privilege of selling others, and that others should not have the privilege of selling you?

Now since you confess, that no person whatever has a right to dispose of you in this manner, you must confess also, that those things are unlawful to be done to you, which are usually done in consequence of the sale. Let us suppose then, that in consequence of the _commerce_ you were forced into a ship; that you were conveyed to another country; that you were sold there; that you were confined to incessant labour; that you were pinched by continual hunger and thirst; and subject to be whipped, cut, and mangled at discretion, and all this at the hands of those, whom you had never offended; would you not think that you had a right to resist their treatment? Would you not resist it with a safe conscience? And would you not be surprized, if your resistance should be termed rebellion?--By the former premises you must answer, yes.--Such then is the case with the wretched _Africans_. They have a right to resist your proceedings. They can resist them, and yet they cannot justly be considered as rebellious. For though we suppose them to have been guilty of crimes to one another; though we suppose them to have been the most abandoned and execrable of men, yet are they perfectly innocent with respect to you _receivers_. You have no right to touch even the hair of their heads without their own consent. It is not your money, that can invest you with a right. Human liberty can neither be bought nor sold. Every lash that you give them is unjust. It is a lash against nature and religion, and will surely stand recorded against you, since they are all, with respect to your _impious_ selves, in a state of nature; in a state of original dissociation; perfectly free.

FOOTNOTES

[Footnote 109: See Part II Chapter I second paragraph.]

[Footnote 110: See Part II Chapter IX last paragraph.]