PROGRESS OF OPINION. 275 



tion then contained in the original free States. It was 

 in 1772 that Lord Mansfield s celebrated decision was 

 delivered, after the energetic action of Granville Sharp, 

 while the first serious steps, in regard to the tea-duty, 

 were not taken in Boston till December 1773. 



The prevailing opinion of the civilised world, at the 

 time, was in favour of slavery. Men s minds were unen 

 lightened, and day had just begun fairly to break upon 

 the subject in England, when the American Revolution 

 broke out. The colonies of England, therefore, as a 

 whole, partook of, and, in fact, reflected the general 

 opinions of England at the time, not only upon slavery, 

 but upon most other subjects of a moral and social kind. 

 If Liverpool and Bristol flourished by the slave-trade, 

 so did the southern provinces of America. If Massachu 

 setts memorialised the home Government on the subject 

 of slavery, the inland towns of England felt as deeply, 

 and expressed themselves as warmly, on the same subject. 

 And the parallel runs still closer and longer together ; 

 for as, at the close of the American War, the slave- 

 holding States, in the framing of the Federal Constitu 

 tion, were strong enough to retain the institution of 

 slavery, in the face of the broadest declaration of the 

 rights of man ever published in a great historical docu 

 ment; so the influence of those interested in slavery was 

 able long to overpower the influence of the people in 

 the British Houses of Parliament, and to maintain and 

 uphold both the institution and the traffic. 



But here the parallel ends, and the picture gradually 

 lightens up on the British side of the Atlantic. With 

 us, the emancipation feeling and influence have been con 

 stantly growing. After long struggles, the slave-trade was 

 abolished in 1807. Further expressions of public opinion 

 led to treaties with foreign countries (with Spain in 

 1817, with Brazil in 1826) for the general abolition of 

 the traffic, and the payment even of large sums of money 



