a subject for
reflection! Alas! how little are we both in our morality and our
principles! We preach up humanity, and yet go every year to bind in
chains twenty thousand natives of Africa! We call the Moors barbarians
and ruffians, because they attack the liberty of Europeans at the risk
of their own; yet these Europeans go, without danger, and as mere
speculators, to purchase slaves by gratifying the avarice of their
masters, and excite all those bloody scenes which are the usual
preliminaries of this traffic!" He goes on still further in the same
strain. He then shows the kind of power which has supported this
execrable trade. He throws out the idea of a general compact, by which
all the European nations should agree to abolish it; and he indulges the
pleasing hope that it may take place even in the present generation.

In the same year we find other coadjutors coming before our view, but
these in a line different from that in which any other belonging to this
class had yet moved. Mr. George White, a clergyman of the established
church, and Mr. John Chubb, suggested to Mr. William Tucket, the mayor
of Bridgewater, where they resided, and to others of that town, the
propriety of petitioning parliament for the abolition of the Slave
Trade. This petition was agreed upon, and, when drawn up, was as
follows:--

"The humble petition of the inhabitants of Bridgewater showeth,

"That your petitioners, reflecting with the deepest sensibility on the
deplorable condition of that part of the human species, the African
Negroes, who, by the most flagitious means, are reduced to slavery and
misery in the British colonies, beg leave to address this honourable
house in their behalf, and to express a just abhorrence of a system of
oppression, which no prospect of private gain, no consideration of
public advantage, no plea of political expediency, can sufficiently
justify or excuse.

"That, satisfied as your petitioners are that this inhuman system meets
with the general execration of mankind, they flatter themselves the day
is not far distant when it will be universally abolished. And they most
ardently hope to see a British parliament, by the extinction of that
sanguinary traffic, extend the blessings of liberty to millions beyond
this realm, held up to an enlightened world a glorious and merciful
example, and stand in the defence of the violated rights of human
nature."

This petition was presented by the Honourable Ann Poulet