Note 1 — Chapter V

It may be urged, we are not the original agents in this trade: it is pursued with eagerness by the Africans themselves. But are those who live in that transcendent light which was granted to dispel the mists of error—to meliorate propensity to evil—to harmonize the rational soul—still to delight in works so dark, still to trample under foot every principle of humanity; still to spurn from them the obligations of justice, still to set at naught the precepts of religion; and to make themselves accomplices with pagan oppressors, in tyrannizing over those hapless beings, whom a mysterious Providence has subjected to their power? Is the Christian trader content to put himself upon a level with the unenlightened despot, and coolly to put his blood-stained profits in the balance, against the laws of religion and his country; laughing at the remonstrances of philanthropists, as the dreams of enthusiasm, or as puerile objections unworthy of attention? No; it surely will not be thus. England has entered the path of mercy1, let her pursue it with energy and constancy: and if other nations refuse to follow her heaven-enlightened way, to them belongs the shame and the guilt of trampling down the laws which bind man to his God and his fellow-man; and, for the violation of which, every individual must be accountable, at that tremendous audit, before which the oppressed and the oppressor shall alike appear!