Leeds Anti-slavery Series, No. 1

BRIEF DEFINITION OF NEGRO SLAVERY.
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"Negro Slavery is the sum of all Villanies." - Wesley
"Slavery is a mass, a system of enormities." - Wm. Pitt.
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     NEGRO slavery is truly what it ever was, "the sum of all villanies."  It reduces a human being as much as possible to the position of a beast, depriving him of all power to act for himself, excluding all knowledge from his mind, robbing him of all power to act for himself, excluding, all knowledge from his mind, robbing him of the rewards of his labours, and working him so severely for gain, as greatly to shorten his life.  It deprives hi of any redress for ill-usage, as he is not allowed to give any evidence in a court of justice.
     Negro slavery is beyond all question the most gigantic system of oppression and iniquity which has ever disgraced our fallen world or degraded our fellow-men; - the most appalling enormity and outrage ever committed under the stimulus of a vicious self-interest.  In whatever light we view it, it is entirely at variance with the genius and spirit of Christianity; and whilst millions of our oppressed and manacled brethren are still groaning under its cruelties, and panting for deliverance from its thraldom, it is our duty to epose, by all possible means, a system so contrary to every principle of justice, humanity, and religion.

     "Enslaving men," says Theodore Weld, an American writer, "is reducing them to articles of property - making free agents chattels - converting persons into things.  A slave is one held in this condition.  In law, 'he owns nothing, and can acquire nothing.'  His right to himself is abrogated.  If he say, my hands, my body, my mind, myself; they are figures of speech.  To use himself for his own good is a crime.  To keep what he
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Sold by W. and F. G. Cash, & Bishopsgate Street, London; and by Jane Jowett, Friends' Meeting Yard, Leeds, at 1s, 2d, per 100.

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erns, is stealing.  To take his body into his own keeping, is insurrection.  in a word, the profit of his masters is made the end of his being, and he a mere means to that end - a mere means to an end into which his interests do not enter, of which they constitute no portion.
     "Man, sunk into a thing! the intrinsic element, the principle of slavery; - men, bartered, leased, mortgaged, bequeathed, invoiced, shipped in cargoes, stored as goods, taken on executions, and knocked off at public outcry!  Their rights, another's conveniences; their interests, wares on sale; their personal, inalienable ownership, a serviceable article, or a plaything; their deathless nature, conscience, social affections, sympathies, hopes, marketable commodities!  This is slavery.  The eternal distinction between a person, and a thing trampled under foot - the crowning distinction of all others - alike the source, the root, and the measure of their value; the national, immortal principle, consecrated by God to universal homage in a baptism of glory and honour , by the gift of His Son, His Spirit, His Word, His presence, providence, and power; His shield, and staff, and sheltering wing; His opening heavens, and angels ministering; and a great voice in heaven proclaiming eternal sanctions, and confirming the Word with signs following."

     Trade suggests ideals of national civilization and enterprise; but the trade in man is a violent outrage upon its legitimate meaning, and  is, in fact, a moral anomaly.  It is an unsightly, hideous excrescence upon the great body of commerce, which mars its beauty, shades its advantages, and vitiates its honours.
     Some idea may be formed of the conflict sustained by a rational and susceptible being when forced from his country, his kindred, and all that renders life most dear; but it is impossible for language to convey a tithe of the agonies or of the unparalleled distress to which the hapless negroes are doomed.  The bare recital of facts connected with their original capture, their being driven in gangs, chained together, over the burning sands of Africa, and then stowed into those frightful receptacles of human woe, the slave ships, to endure the incalculable horrors of the middle passage, and, lastly, pout up like beasts at the auction-block - the bare recital of such facts fills the mind with horror.

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     And what is the condition of the hapless victims of this nefarious system in the last stage to which they are reduced by their iron-hearted oppressors, which is a hopeless, endless state of slavery?
     Reader, listen again! "The slave is unprotected by the laws of his country, and stands without one recognized right, fully exposed to the storms of passion, the venom of prejudice, and the scorn of pride.  Left almost entirely to the caprice of his owners, he may be abused and even murdered with impunity.  If he escapes from his detested bondage, he is advertised in the public papers by his 'cropped ears,' or his 'scars from iron collars,' &c., &c.  Letters are branded with hot iron on his feet, and the law of his country is silent; he is hunted by blood-hounds - the law is silent; his weeping child is forcibly separated from him for ever - the law is silent; the woman whom he loves (to call her his wife is a cruel mockery) is torn from his hands and sold - the law is silent; she is sometimes compelled - compelled by the lash (would to heaven this were a lie, and not the awful truth) to submit to the polluting embraces of her crime-loving master - the law is silent still - silent even here.  When, then, does it speak, and what does it say?  Let us hear.
     "A man wants money; he looks at another man, and calculates the value of his sinews.  Then, the law says, sell him.  He sends him to the market - to the shambles.  He may, perchance, feel some small wish to escape, and betray himself - the law says, chain him.  He has received a deep personal injury - the law says I will not take, shall not even hear his evidence.  He is found on a road, with six other coloured persons, but with 'no white person' - the law says let him receive twenty lashes!  He meets together with a few ore of his unfortunate lass for religious purposes - the law says, disperse and lash them!  A 'free man' teaches a slave to read - the law says, lash him too.  A slave has taught himself to read, or has been taught by stealth, and attempt to teach his child to read the Bible - the law still cries out too, lash him; and Louisiana says, if he dare commit this offence a second time, the penalty I inflict is - death!"
     Such are the tender mercies of slavery!  Justly, indeed, has it been termed the "Crowning Crime of Christendom."  How

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long shall its barbarities continue to affright, and its pollutions sicken and soul?
     Seven and a half millions of our fellow-creature are yet suffering from its unparalleled atrocities!  Held as goods and chattels, the property of other human being, transferred form one owner to another, like beasts that perish!  The contemplation is as awful as it is true.  Seven and a half millions of our fellow-creatures!  Seven and a half millions of men, women, and children, with tearful eyes, and with uplifted hands, with branded and bleeding bodies, with lacerated feet and clanking chains, supplicate on bended knees for the restoration of their rights.
     Reader!  assist.  I implore thee, in the great contest for liberty, that the full blessings of Christianity may be bestowed, and "the dew of kindness distilled, upon the most helpless and injured portion of the human family."  "Laurels more fair, victory more glorious, never yet graced the annals of Christian warfare, than would be won and worn by three, if clad in the armour of God, thou wouldst assail the battlements and bulwarks of oppression till they should totter and fall.  Proudly as they lfe their summits to the skies, exulting in having stood long as conspicuous and lofty as they stand now, yet vain is their glory, deceptive is their strength.  The very citadel of slavery is founded upon 'hay and stubble,' and the frail edifice is no better prepared to resist a steady vigorous charge from a mighty phalanx of united Christians, than is the house of sand which the child erects upon the shore to withstand the force of the overwhelming billow.  Even as the vestiges of that fragile toy are borne away into the sea, so would the onward march of those great conquerors, religion and virtue, sweep away every trace of an institution which mars the beauty of God's moral creation, by interrupting the happiness and defiling the purity of mankind."

Leeds Anti-slavery Series. No. 1.
Sold by W. and F. G. CASH, 5, Bishopsgate Street, London; and by JANE JOWETT, Friends' Meeting Yard, Leeds, at 1s. 2. per 100.