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IMPOLICY OF THE SLAVE-TRADE. 



fore we cannot be surprised that the Brazilians 

 should still consider it as being founded upon 

 truth. It isHheir interest so to think, (or, at any 

 rate, they imagine that it is their interest,) and 

 they have no books or other means by which 

 they might be undeceived. To the planters I 

 fear that scarcely any arguments would be of 

 any avail ; they imagine that without slaves their 

 estates must decay, and therefore they fortify 

 themselves under the notion of the humanity of 

 the trade by which they obtain their supplies. 

 If the chief body of the priests could be con- 

 vinced of its cruelty, — of the effect which this 

 trade has to render still more prominent than 

 they would otherwise be, the bad qualities of 

 the natives of Africa in their own country, and 

 to check every thing that is good ; — of its 

 direct tendency to increase the manifold evils 

 of the state of society existing in the parts of 

 that continent which are subject to the resort of 

 slave-dealers ; — if the clergy could be made to 

 believe that by their voice they were sanctioning 

 one of the most shocking systems under which 

 the world ever laboured, I know that their aid 

 would be given to the abolition. I am aware 

 likewise of the weight which their opinions carry 

 with them among all other descriptions of per- 

 sons. One of the chief arguments with the 

 priesthood is the advantages which the Africans 

 receive from their entrance into the Catholic 



