Page:Copley 1844 A History of Slavery and its Abolition 2nd Ed.djvu/334

316 of obtaining freedom; liberty, if obtained, in great danger of being lost; their very skin being presumed an evidence of slavery in the absence of positive proof to the contrary; and, finally, the perpetuation of the wretched inheritance of slavery to their offspring.

On these facts the society grounded its appeal that some effectual steps should be taken for mitigating the rigours of negro bondage, or for putting an end to a condition so grievously outraging every feeling of humanity, and violating every principle both of the British constitution and of the christian religion. Even admitting the possibility of some danger or inconvenience arising from immediately liberating all the actual victims of the slave-trade, or their adult descendants, yet the committee urged that no satisfactory reason could be assigned why, since the abolition of the trade, children should continue to inherit the unhappy condition of their parents, which was admitted to be an unjust infliction. They also felt justly convinced, that no institution so directly at variance with the will of the supreme Governor of the universe could prove a source of permanent advantage, either to nations or individuals; but that slavery was as detrimental to the interests of the slave-owner, as cruel and oppressive to the slave, and that its abolition would prove an unspeakable benefit to both. The colonists, indeed, alleged that they should sustain a great actual loss by such a change in the system. This, however, remained for proof; and if any such injury were sustained, their claim for redress lay not with the already injured negro, but with the British people. This train of argument is successfully followed up in