totally considered as _cattle_, or _beasts of labour_; their
very children, if any should be born to them in that situation, being
previously destined to the condition of their parents. But here a
question arises, which, will interrupt the thread of the narration for a
little time, viz. how far their descendants, who compose the fifth order
of slaves, are justly reduced to servitude, and upon what principles the
_receivers_ defend their conduct.

Authors have been at great pains to inquire, why, in the ancient
servitude, the child has uniformly followed the condition of the mother.
But we conceive that they would have saved themselves much trouble, and
have done themselves more credit, if instead of, endeavouring to
reconcile the custom with _heathen_ notions, or their own laboured
conjectures, they had shewn its inconsistency with reason and nature,
and its repugnancy to common justice. Suffice it to say, that the whole
theory of the ancients, with respect to the descendants slaves, may be
reduced to this principle, "that as the parents, by becoming
_property_, were wholly considered as _cattle_, their children,
like _the progeny of cattle_, inherited their parental lot."

Such also is the excuse of the tyrannical _receivers_
before-mentioned. They allege, that they have purchased the parents,
that they can sell and dispose of them as they please, that they possess
them under the same laws and limitations as their cattle, and that their
children, like the progeny of these, become their property _by
birth_.

But the absurdity of the argument will immediately appear. It depends
wholly on the supposition, that the parents are _brutes_. If they
are _brutes_, we shall instantly cease to contend: if they are
_men_, which we think it not difficult to prove, the argument must
immediately fall, as we have already shewn that there cannot justly be
any _property_ whatever in the _human species_.

It has appeared also, in the second part of this Essay, that as nature
made, every man's body and mind _his own_, so no _just_ person
can be reduced to slavery against his own _consent_. Do the
unfortunate offspring ever _consent_ to be slaves?--They are slaves
from their birth.--Are they _guilty_ of crimes, that they lose
their freedom?--They are slaves when they cannot speak.--Are their
_parents_ abandoned? The crimes of the parents cannot justly extend
to the children.

Thus then must the tyrannical _receivers_, who presume to s