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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Untitled Article
lrfffe ' tFrolfope * jourmls of Captain SMtorasa and Mrs * Butler , incipient pleasures and alarms at the ac ^ Jbt of sundry ' works in the pre « s / and pastimes « g ^ ng to pr int ; * the land of literature & * 6 0 tergTOwn > that the observations and disquisitions of philosopher * and statesmen can Krdly find room to plant those seeds which they vrould fain see in a fair way of springing up , and ramifying into vast roots and mighty foliage .
An account of the condition and prospects of the coloured populatioft of the United States , occupies by far the larger portion of the present work . We are occasionally obliged to confess , that the strong feeling excited in the author by the actual sight of their degraded condition , and his continual irritation at the prejudice manifested against them , have led hixng | a make too little allowance for the circumstances which have vH ^^ fed , and which
continue to foster these prejudices . He hagJHHrfever , supp lied us with amp le evidence of their existence , ana we cannot but sympathize with him in the strength of emotion he expresses , though we may sometimes demur to the reasonings and conclu-Pofes to which it led him . Speaking of the Americans he says ,
* It was inexpressibly painful to my mind to witness the blindness and self-dtlaskm under which these people laboured . It was a psychological £ ftom * Jy that I could not comprehend—an irreconcileabie contsatiddHt to every idea I had formed of intelligent and reasonable JfehttjHF * -an afflicting picture of ** a naked human heart , " with all its IHopeeivable incongruities . Night and day was I tormented by the HM » si bitter reflections . I was living with men I could not esteem . I felt it was unmanly to be silent : and I knew it was vain to remonstrate . '—vol . i . p . 361 .
' * America is deeply in debt to outraged humanity . She has enriched herself by p ^ inder and oppression . —The day of settlement is at hand;—the creditors are clamorous and impatient : —there will be no peace for ksr till her drafts on Africa are paid . Not the least part of the debt it involved in the cruel indignities to which the free sons of those who
-wore stolen from their native land are subjected by the descendants of th * robbers . The heart sickens at the recital of their wrongs . I can l Stfy , Wth the utmost sincerity , that I left England with a wish to do justice to America . I thought her character had been misrepresented , arid i warn anxious to collect facts that I might adduce in her vindicau « $ on my return . I soon found , however , that I must throw up my 4 Misfte ~ 41 ie libel had become a criminal indictment ; and the former the de fen am in the and
' ¦^ Hf *** d . I now witness-box ; I trust VPHhs * of justice will still be satisfied . Why should ridicule be pro-4 Sc € mwL , if oppression is to go unpunished and unrebuked ? What are tttoitestik * the American * complain of haying received from strangers , * Os * pai * sV with the iagariet they have heaped upon their own countrymen ?' >** mdksb pp . ML , 9 M . 0
'f ^ e ijiigft strong as these , it will readil y be believed , have Wsrailift subject of th * obUmred population almost an engrossing one with the author . His book also contains some rery interest-
Untitled Article
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Nov. 2, 1835, page 730, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2651/page/38/
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