MORAL AND INTELLECTUAL QUALITIES. 423 



ing the differences of moral feelings and intellectual power; 

 having stated them strongly, 1 am anxious to express my 

 decided opinion that these differences are not sufficient in 

 any instance to warrant us in referring a particular race to 

 an originally different species. They are not greater in kind 

 or degree than those which we see in many animals, as in 

 horses, asses, mules, dogs, and cocks. I protest especially 

 against the opinion, which either denies to the Africans the 

 enjoyment of reason, or ascribes to the whole race propensi- 

 ties so vicious, malignant, and treacherous, as would degrade 

 them even below the level of the brute. It can be proved 

 most clearly, and the preceding observations are sufhcient 

 for this purpose, that there is no circumstance of bodily 

 structure so peculiar to the Negro, as not to be found also 

 in other far distant nations ; no character, which does not 

 run into those of other races by the insensible grada- 

 tions, as those which connect together all the varieties of 

 mankind. I deem the moral and intellectual character of the 

 Negro inferior, and decidedly so, to that of the European ; 

 and, as this inferiority arises from a corresponding difference 

 of organization, I must regard it as his natural destiny : but 

 I do not consider him more inferior than the other dark 

 races. I can neither admit the reasoning nor perceive the 

 humanity of those who, after tearing the African from his 

 native soil, carrying him to the West Indies, and dooming 

 him there to perpetual slavery and labour, complain that his 

 understanding shews no signs of improvement, and that his 

 temper and disposition are incorrigibly perverse, faithless, 

 and treacherous. Let us, however, observe him in a some- 

 what more favourable state than in those dreadful receptacles 

 of human misery, the crowded decks of the slave-ship, or 

 in the less openly shocking, but constrained and extorted, 

 and therefore painful labours of the sugar plantation. 



That the Negroes behave to others according to the 

 treatment they receive, may be easily gathered from the best 

 sources of information. They have not, indeed, reached that 

 sublime height, the beau ideal of morality, the returning 

 good for evil, probably because their masters have not yet 



