312 FORMS OF THE SKULL. 



slology, could fail to recognize a decided approach to the 

 animal form. This inferiority of organization is attended 

 witli corresponding inferiority of faculties ; which may be 

 proved, not so much by the unfortunate beings who are de- 

 graded by slavery, as by every fact in the past history and 

 present condition of Africa. 



I state these plain results of observation and experience 

 without any fear that you will find in them either apology 

 or excuse for Negro slavery. In the warm and long disputes 

 on this subject, both parties have contrived to be in the 

 wrong, in the question regarding the Negro faculties. The 

 abolitionists have erred in denying a natural inferiority, so 

 clearly evinced by the concurring evidences of anatomical 

 structure and experience. But it was only an error of fact ; 

 and may be the more readily excused, as it was on the side 

 of humanity. 



Their opponents have committed the more serious moral 

 mistake of perverting what should constitute a clami to 

 kindness and indulgence into justification or palliation of 

 the revolting and antichristian practice of traffic in human 

 flesh ; a practice branded with the double curse of equal 

 degradation to the op])ressor and the oppressed. This very 

 argument, which has been used for defence, seems to me a 

 tenfold aggravation of the enormity. Superior endowments, 

 higher intellect, greater capacity for knowledge, arts, and 

 science, should be employed to extend the blessings of civi- 

 lization, and multiply the enjoyments of social life; not as 

 a means of oppressing the weak and ignorant, of plunging 

 those who are naturally low in the intellectual scale still 

 more deeply into the abyss of barbarism. 



When we see a strong and well-armed person attack one 

 equally powerful and well-prepared, we are indifferent as to 

 the issue ; or we may look on with that interest which the 

 qualities called forth by the contest are calculated to inspire. 

 But, if the strong attack the weak ; if the well-armed assail 

 the defenceless ; If the ingenuity, knowledge, and skill, the 

 superior arts and arms of civilized life, are combined to 

 rob the poor savage of his only valuable property, per- 



