2 9 5 HISTORY OF THE [book vi. 
a half, which have nearly elapsed since their first 
settlement, it may be supposed that the conduct of 
Great Britain towards them (notwithstanding the 
proceedings on which I have presumed to animad¬ 
vert in the foregoing chapter) has generally been 
founded in kindness and liberality; and that the 
murmurs and complaints which have sometimes 
proceeded from the planters, when new and heavy 
duties have been laid on their staples, have been 
equally ungrateful and unjust; the fastidious pee¬ 
vishness of opulent folly, and surfeited prosperity. 
Charges to this effect have indeed been frequently 
urged against the planters of the West Indies, with 
a spirit of bitterness and rancour, which inclines one 
to think, that a small degree of envy (excited, per¬ 
haps, by the splendid appearance of a few opulent 
individuals among them resident in Great Britain) 
is blended in the accusation. They would therefore 
have remained unnoticed by me, were they not, on 
frequent occasions, introductory of doctrines and 
opinions as extraordinary in their nature, as dange¬ 
rous in their tendency; for, supported as they are by 
persons of ability and influence, they cannot fail, if 
adopted by ministers, and carried from the national 
councils into measures, to widen our recent wounds, 
and make a general massacre of our whole system 
of colonization. 
Of these doctrines and opinions, so far as they 
concern the British plantations in the West Indies, 
the following is a fair abstract and abridgment: 
