The Debate on a Motion for the Abolition of the Slave-trade: In the House of Commons on Monday the Second of April, 1792

Front Cover

From inside the book

Selected pages

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 41 - Of law there can be no less acknowledged, than that her seat is the bosom of God, her voice the harmony of the world ; all things in heaven and earth do her homage, the very least as feeling her care, and the greatest as not exempted from her power...
Page 39 - The neighbourhood of the Darnel and Tin keep them perpetually at war, the benefit of which accrues to the Company, who buy all the prisoners made on either side ; and the more there are to sell, the greater is their profit ; for the only end of their armaments is to make captives, to sell them to the White traders.
Page 168 - ... their own argument of its injustice? If on the ground of injustice it ought to be abolished at last, why ought it not now ? Why is injustice to be suffered to remain for a single hour...
Page 169 - Africa a scene of bloodshed and misery, a supply of victims increasing in proportion to our demand. Can we then hesitate in deciding whether the wars in Africa are their wars or ours ? It was our arms in the river Cameroon put into the hands of the trader, that furnished him with the means of pushing his trade ; and I have no more doubt that they are British arms put into the hands of Africans, which promote universal war and desolation, than I can doubt their having done so in that individual instance.
Page 182 - Africa, engaged in the calm occupations of industry, in the pursuits of a just and legitimate commerce. We may behold the beams of science and philosophy breaking in upon their land, which at some...
Page 3 - Day being read, for the Houfe to refolve itfelf into a Committee of the whole Houfe, to confider of the Petition of the fubfcribing Merchants and Traders of the City of London, fcff.
Page 100 - If you prick him, does he not bleed ? If you tickle him, does he not laugh ? If you poison him, does he not die ? And if you wrong him, does he not revenge?
Page 171 - ... is withered and blasted ; under whose shade nothing that is useful or profitable to Africa will ever flourish or take root. Long as that continent has been known to navigators, the extreme line and boundaries of its coasts is all with which Europe is...
Page 174 - to humanity. We are second to none of you in our zeal for the good of Africa, — but the French will not abolish, — the Dutch will not abolish. We wait, therefore, on prudential principles, till they join us, or set us an example." How, Sir, is this enormous evil ever to be eradicated, if every nation is thus prudentially to wait till the concurrence of all the world shall have been obtained? — Let me remark too, that there is no nation in Europe that has, on the one hand, plunged so deeply...
Page 183 - Africa, that the measure proposed by my honourable friend most forcibly recommends itself to my mind. The great and happy change to be expected in the state of her inhabitants is, of all the various and important benefits of the abolition, in my estimation, incomparably the most extensive and important.

Bibliographic information