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AFRICA AND AMERICA.
was concerned, to quit herself of all legal responsibility
in the same. Yet there was still need of labor and
effort. The slave trade was still carried on: connived
at by some nations, sanctioned by others. And slavery,
its fruitful source, was still in existence; and human
beings were sold, bartered, and scourged, and murdered,
beneath the British flag and under the sanction of
British law. Mr. Clarkson could not remain indiffer¬
ent to all this crime and barbarity. Infirm as he was,
growing aged too, yet he felt himself stirred to manly
effort and humane activity. Clarkson was not like too
many of our American divines, who can declaim with
sensibility and pathos over that horrid African slave
trade; and at the next breath, defend the slave trade of
our own country; and prove the System of Slavery, a
Patriarchal Institution, and established by God ! Not
so he. He saw, as any pure mind can see, that the
slave trade and slavery, both come under the same
category, and merit the same condemnation, as equally
and alike, systems of rapine, lust, robbery, and murder,
in their incipiency and in all their fruits and details.
Against British West India Slavery he now directed his
energies; and endeavored to arouse the repugnance of
his countrymen. For this purpose he drew up and
published an able treatise, entitled " Thoughts on the
necessity of Abolishing Slavery." This work was fol¬
lowed by several others upon the same subject, which,
with the combined exertions of several other Abolition¬
ists, the first among the great men of England, suc¬
ceeded in arousing that strong feeling which, shook and
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