1830.] Letters on the West India Question. *687 



" But it may be asked, is slavery then to be interminable in our colonies, or 

 what is the course meant to be followed ? I humbly conceive, it is not for me 

 to attempt to say when a system should terminate which Almighty God, in the 

 divine wisdom of his over-ruling providence, has seen fit to permit in certain 

 climates since the origin and formation of society in this world; whilst in other 

 climates, where man is found in a more civilized state, and influenced by dif- 

 ferent feelings, the same purposes have been answered by those distinctions 

 which rank and subordination have created." 



He affirms that the measures already adopted by Parliament are 

 quite sufficient for the gradual abolition of the system. 



In the United States, a republican government, jealous of freedom and 

 of the rights of its citizens; with a people every where advocating 

 humane and liberal principles ; individually watching over their privi- 

 leges ; to whom the distinctions of rank and subordination are almost 

 invidious ; where no want of strong religious feeling nor of a sense of 

 duty exists ; where institutions and societies abound for promoting 

 the temporal and eternal interests of the community ; and where the 

 labour of the slaves are in general much more severe than in the British 

 Colonies, 



" We hear of no petitions, of no applications from the people to their legis- 

 lature, to put a period to the existence of slavery, such as our Parliament con- 

 tinues to be incessantly assailed with. And why ? The truth is, they live 

 in the same land, where all have constant opportunities of observation, and therefore 

 become intimately acquainted with the character and habits of the negro, the 

 nature of his gratifications, and his ruling passions. This knowledge leads 

 them to acquiesce in the existing state of things, as necessary and unavoidable, 

 whilst they know that the comforts and wants of the slaves are cared for and 

 attended to." 



However unpalatable this view of the subject may be to the immediate 

 abolitionists, it is very necessary to take it into deliberate consideration 

 in viewing the difficulties of the subject. Mr. Gladstone makes a 

 powerful appeal to the warm-hearted abolitionists, in favour of the work- 

 ing classes at home* 



" Let them, among other quarters where large bodies of the working classes 

 are congregated together, visit those immense buildings in which the manufac- 

 tures in cotton and in metals are carried on; let them encounter the increased 

 degree of heat, and offensive, if not unwholesome, effluvia with which they 

 abound ; let them behold the squalid looks of most of the people that labour 

 within them, pinched to earn enough to purchase the common necessaries of 

 life for themselves and their families, whilst they are generally strangers to 

 its comforts." 



He then adverts to the state of the labourers throughout the country 

 generally, and adds 



" Let them visit Ireland, and enter the hut of the poor peasant where no 

 poor laws exist to aid or diminish his wants ; let them examine his hollow 

 looks, his wretched clothing, insufficient to cover hisnakedness, his want of em- 

 ployment, though willing to work, and his ignorance of both his rights and his 

 duties ; let them examine his dwelling, inhabited promiscuously by his family 

 and his pigs, all partaking of the same food, and that too often in scanty sup- 

 ply, where in untoward seasons, when prematurely exhausted, he has been 

 left to starve and perish, unheeded and uncared for !" " Let them then visit 



* We trust it will not be thrown away. No state of slavery can be more miserable 

 than that of the poor children in the cotton manufactories at Bradford. Children under 

 fourteen have here been destined to labour thirteen hours a day with only one solitary half- 

 hour's cessation from their toil ! ! ! Like charity, abolition should begin at home. Ed. 



