Page:A dissertation on slavery - with a proposal for the gradual abolition of it, in the state of Virginia. (IA dissertationonsl00tuckrich).pdf/107

 to be softened, yet, its regularity, and punctual administration should be increased, rather than relaxed. If we doubt the propriety of such measures, what must we think of the situation of our country, when instead of 300,000, we shall have more than two millions of among us? This must happen within a, if we do not set about the abolition of slavery. Will not our posterity curse the days of their nativity with all the anguish of Job? Will they not execrate the memory of those ancestors, who, having it in their power to avert evil, have, like their first parents, entailed a curse upon all future generations? We know that the rigour of the laws respecting slaves unavoidably must increase with their numbers: What a blood-stained code must that be which is calculated for the restraint of millions held in bondage! Such must our unhappy country exhibit within a century, unless we are both wise and just enough to avert from posterity the calamity and reproach, which are otherwise unavoidable.

I am not vain enough to presume the plan I have suggested entirely free from objection; nor that in offering my own ideas on the subject, I have been more