366 HISTORY OF THE [book m 
manners, their numbers may be kept up by natu¬ 
ral increase. If this good consequence shall happily 
be produced, it cannot be doubted, that the slave- 
trade will of itself gradually diminish, and perhaps 
in a few years cease altogether, and expire with¬ 
out a struggle. 
Rut these, and all other regulations which can 
be devised for the protection and improvement of 
this unfortunate class of people, will be of little 
avail, unless, as a preliminary measure, they shall 
be exempted from the cruel hardship to which they 
are now frequently liable, of being sold by creditors, 
and made subject, in a course of administration by 
executors, to the payment of all debts both of sim¬ 
ple contract and specialty. This grievance, so re¬ 
morseless and tyrannical in its principle, and so 
dreadful in its effects, though not originally crea¬ 
ted, is now upheld and confirmed by a British act 
of parliament; and no less authority is compe¬ 
tent to redress it. It was an act procured by, and 
passed for the benefit of British creditors; and I 
blush to add, that its motive and origin have sanc¬ 
tified the measure, even in the opinion of men w T ho 
are among the loudest of the declaimers against 
slavery and the slave trade.* Thus the odious se- 
* The act alluded to, is the 5 George II. c. 7. entitled, <c An act 
for the more easy recovery of debts in his majesty’s plantations.” Of 
the most violent of the petitioners to parliament, not one has solicited 
the repeal of this execrable statute. The society in the Old Jewry, 
though apprized of the grievance, its origin and the remedy, are silent 
