Nathaniel S. Prime

“ This day commences the 50th year of freedom to American white men, and yet a million and a half of our fellow men, within our own dwellings, are this moment groaning under the chains of bondage. Tell me not, as it is often told by the advocates of slavery, that they are incapable of providing for themselves; and are therefore happier in their present dependent condition, than if they were immediately emancipated. I cheerfully admit that the little feathered songster that was hatched in a cage or incarcerated before his wings were fledged, may be ignorant of most of the sweets of liberty ”

“ Now it is useless for a man to plead not guilty to the charge of murder, because he has taken the life of only one individual, while others may have slain their thousands. It is the principle we are concerned with, and the principle of slavery has been as firmly sanctioned in most of the northern states, as in any part of the union; though our citizens have never found it for their interest to carry it as far. But for this single circumstance, I presume every farm in this region would now be cultivated by the labour, and watered by the sweat of negroes. ”

“ It is therefore most palpably manifest, that if our slaves are ever to enjoy all the blessings of liberty, they must not only be liberated from the chains of bondage, but at the same time, be placed in a situation in which they may aspire to all the advantages and distinctions of civilized life.
2. In some of the states, even where slavery is abolished, the blacks are disfranchised of the rights of citizens. To the eternal disgrace of our own state, the despotick principles of our Constitution have been multiplied instead of being diminished by the late Convention. ”

“ This amazing change in sentiment and feeling, I am unwilling to ascribe so much to what is often alleged, that they find the evils of slavery far less than they expected, and the subjects of it contented and happy; as to the fact, that familiarity with any vice blinds the human mind to its enormity. ”

“ Thy complexion is indeed black, but comely; and thy soul has been washed in the fountain of redeeming grace, as white and as pure as the redeemed of any other clime; and thou canst now chaunt as high a note of praise to the 20God of thy salvation; and though here thou hast been excluded from the rights of freemen, and the society of white men, yet in heaven thou shalt mingle, without discrimination, among the blood-bought throng, and there occupy as high a throne, and wear as bright a crown. ”

“ A man may also forfeit his liberty, and even his life, by the commission of crimes against the interests of society. And in all such cases, every nation on the globe has a charter from the King of heaven to inflict merited punishment. But surely no man of common sense will pretend that this authorizes any individual or commonwealth to reduce to perpetual bondage, and entail the same on their posterity, those who have never violated a single law of the land. ”

“ By it, all the horrours of the slave-trade, the whole root and stock and branch of which slavery is the bitter fruit, were firmly sanctioned for thirty tedious years. During this gloomy period, under the sanction of the charter of freemen, and of freemen too, who, in the days of their emancipation from the chains of despotism, appealed to heaven for the sincerity of their intentions, while they declared to the world “that all men are created equal, and endowed by their Creator with an unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness;” ”

“ The immediate emancipation of all the slaves, would doubtless be attended with consequences, both upon themselves and the whites, vastly more terrible and distressing, than all the horrours of slavery. ”

“ If then, all men are, by their birth, entitled to the same natural rights and privileges, they can be divested of them only by the authority of Him who has the power of life and death in his hands. The God of nature has a perfect right to authorize one nation to subjugate another, as he delivered the Canaanites into the hands of Israel. But surely this is no argument in favour of American slavery. ”

“ God deals with nations, in this world, on a different principle from what he deals with individuals.—The wicked man is often permitted to prosper in his sins, and to die without pain; because the righteous retributions of justice await him in the eternal world.—But wicked nations exist, in their national capacity, only in this life. Therefore, if national sins are ever visited with the indignation of heaven, it must be in the present world. Hence, we may draw the conclusion, that if American slavery is offensive to God, the judgments of heaven are now impending over this guilty nation. ”

“ That is, all the duties which God has ever required of man in relation to his own species, either in the law or the prophets, are comprehended in this single precept, Do to others just as you would wish them to do to you. Did this principle regulate the conduct of all men, the earth would instantly resume the first bloom of Eden. Not only would war, and murder and rapine cease to desolate the earth, but animosities and contention and oppression of every kind and degree would instantly disappear. ”

“ We proclaim to the world that we are the only nation of freemen on earth, and yet daily practise the most absolute despotism. It is frequently the case that the same publick newspaper which unblushingly asserts the equality of our rights, and the justice of our institutions, advertises a whole village of human beings for sale. ”

“ In view of the numerous and simultaneous efforts of the Christian world to extend the blessings of the gospel to the ends of the earth, we may justly consider the exertions of the American Colonization Society as ultimately, though not directly, aiming at the same object; and we may with propriety regard the Institution as one important wheel in that vast system of moral machinery which, under the blessing of heaven, is destined to regenerate a fallen world. ”

“ Though transported to the most distant countries, and situated in the most temperate regions of the globe, and transmitted through a series of generations, they still retain in the constitution of their frames, and on the whole surface of their bodies, the title of heaven to those torrid climes. The God of nature has evidently determined, that they shall never be divested of their original inheritance. ”

“ Must Christianity sacrifice its holy principles at the shrine of pagan impurity? Must we be satisfied to have men embrace the faith of the gospel, while they retain their own ungodly practices? No! But wisdom is profitable to direct.—Some method must be adopted by which these deeply-rooted evils may be branded with disgrace, and thus gradually but effectually eradicated. ”

“ They rejoiced to hear, that, in one nation at least of this fallen world, after the lapse of almost 6000 years, THE RIGHTS OF MAN were at last understood, and a solemn resolution to respect them had been unanimously adopted: that universal emancipation had been proclaimed to three millions of the human family. ”

“ And this is the grand reason of all that present dulness and stupidity, which are frequently adduced, as evidence that negroes are a race of beings but little elevated above the brutal creation. If therefore universal liberty should be proclaimed through our land, and the African race still be permitted to live in the midst of us, disfranchised by our feelings and customs, if not by our laws, [2] of the rights of freemen, we have no reason to suppose that they would be essentially improved or benefited by their freedom. ”

“ But even admitting that the efforts of this Society should never ultimately accomplish the object of its aim, the entire abolition of American slavery, there is one important result which it cannot fail to produce. Besides securing the blessings of freedom and self-government to some of those who had previously groaned under the chains of bitter servitude, it will afford a ready introduction of the blessings of civilization and the gospel to the benighted tribes of Africa. ”

“ Had the evangelists and apostles explicitly denounced the tyranny of Rome, and declared that slavery was contrary to the law of nature, and the law of God, they would have been instantly slain, or driven, at the point of the sword, from every province of the Roman empire. ”

“ Thy mother’s children shall no longer be angry with thee, because thou art black, because the sun hath looked upon thee—they shall no longer make thee keeper of their vineyards, while thine own vineyard lies waste. ”

“ Thy parched ground has become a pool, and thy thirsty land springs of water. In the habitation of dragons, where each lay, there is grass with reeds and rushes. And a high way is there, and a way that is called the Way of Holiness: the unclean shall not pass over it: but it shall be for thee; the way-faring men, though fools, shall not err therein. No lion shall be there, nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon, it shall not be found there ”

“ Adventitious circumstances might still produce distinctions in the relative situations of men; but pride, that fiend of hell and enemy of happiness, would be banished from the human breast; and one more prospered of heaven than his fellows, would look down upon them, not to despise their poverty, nor to rejoice in their misery, nor to deprive them of their liberty; (the last earthly blessing that man can lose;) ”

“ Suppose, in a nation where polygamy is extensively practised, every man could be induced to repudiate all his wives but one; how many thousands of helpless women and children would be turned on the wide world, without the means of support, exposed to inevitable wretchedness and want! The sudden adoption of the true Christian principle, under these circumstances, would be productive of vastly greater misery than is now experienced from this horrid pagan practice ”

“ And in Louisiana as early as 1810 there were 5 blacks to every four white men. It is obvious, that, at this rate, in the course of a few years, those districts of our country will be covered with a black population; in comparison with which, the whites will appear as grasshoppers before them. Now I ask, in such a state of things, what can hinder the blacks from arising, and after avenging all their wrongs, by slaying their opposers, taking possession of those very lands as the reward of their own and their fathers’ labours? ”

“ The whole human family would be bound together by the sense of a common nature, and the bonds of sincere affection: in a word, they would feel that they were bone of each other’s bone; and flesh of each other’s flesh ”

“ With what an ill grace then can any, who have implicitly or explicitly sworn allegiance to the institutions of their respective states and the general government, especially those who have been, or still are the owners of human flesh and blood, hold up their heads and say, “We are pure from the blood of Africans?” ”

“ In what district of our country will the latter become willing to connect themselves with the former in the relations of the domestick circle? What legislature will be willing to admit the negro to equal privileges and powers with the white man, on the floor of the senate chamber? What University will hold forth the same advantages and honours to our own children and the descendants of Africans? ”

“ Did you never see a cloud, no bigger than a man’s hand, at its first appearance, finally overspread the whole horizon and pour a copious blessing on the thirsty earth? What plan of benevolence, in this fallen world, was not small at its commencement? Even the 18kingdom of God was once like a grain of mustard seed; but it has gradually increased and will continue to grow till it fills the world. ”

“ By the laws of some of the slave-holding states, no man can emancipate his own slaves; and any person is liable to the barbarous and disgraceful punishment of being whipped on the naked back, if convicted of teaching a slave to read. Thus 14the poor Africans are not only deprived of their liberty, but are completely cut off from almost the only means of information, with respect to their duty to God and their fellow men, and of preparation for the eternal world ”

“ Every motive that can interest the philanthropist, the patriot, the Christian and the Christian Missionary is presented in this subject, and he that can be insensible of its influence is unworthy to occupy a place in human society, unless in the capacity of “a servant of servants.” ”

“ By the old Constitution, only one class of citizens were divested of certain natural rights without having committed any crime to forfeit them. But by the present Constitution there are two. And the reasons in both cases are very similar; in the one, wearing a black coat, and in the other, a black skin. But the operation of these regulations is much more oppressive in the latter, than in the former case. The colour of a man’s dress depends on his own will ”

“ By these laws, a pious and benevolent master, who has inherited a hundred slaves, and who would gladly deliver them from bondage, or, at least, alleviate, by every means in his power, the miseries of their condition, is compelled, against every feeling of his heart, not only to hold them in servitude, but to keep them in absolute ignorance. ”

“ And although this country is not strictly speaking a pagan country, yet the practice in question is a pagan practice; and so effectually wrought into the habits and feelings and institutions of our land, that its complete extirpation must necessarily be the work of time.—But here let it be particularly observed, that, in all such cases, we have no licence for the toleration of any sinful custom, a single moment, without the adoption of wise and prudent measures calculated ultimately to abolish it. ”