Page:Copley 1844 A History of Slavery and its Abolition 2nd Ed.djvu/356

338 These remarks, originally uttered with reference to the slave-trade, were found to bear with equal force on the system of slavery in general.

About this time considerable attention was excited by a series of lectures, by Rev. B. Godwin, classical tutor of a dissenting academy, Bradford, delivered first in the Exchange of that populous town, and afterwards at York and Scarborough. These lectures were published and widely circulated. They contain a valuable digest of the facts and arguments connected with negro slavery, and will, probably, be long referred to as an historical document, though the question is happily set at rest.

At the public meeting of the Anti-slavery Society, held May 3rd, the Duke of Gloucester presided, and the crowded room evinced the deep and abiding interest felt in the cause. Mr. Brougham beautifully alluded to the venerable Wilberforce (who was present). He apologized for preceding him in addressing the meeting, which an indispensable professional engagement compelled him to do, "presuming," he said, "to address you thus early, and thereby to delay, though but for a few minutes, the high gratification of your hearing once more lifted up in this place, that voice so dear to humanity and freedom, which sounded the trumpet of our earliest victory, and is now happily and mercifully preserved to marshal us to our latest triumph." This well-timed expression of deserved homage was received with affectionate applause by the numerous assembly. Mr. B. continued, in an animated strain, expressing the confidence he felt in the success of the cause, from the united and continued zeal of those around