into families, and
suppose there may be as many, as one in three or four of them, who is
a head of a family, say 100,000; and that they own all the slaves: in
that case, there would be an average of twenty slaves to every white
head of a Christian family in the slave States. But here again all the
slaves would be absorbed: all the North innocent, above two-thirds of
the Christians at the South proved to be not slave holders at all;
and all the followers of the devil wholly innocent of that crime.
These calculations demonstrate that these accusations are as
groundless and absurd as any of the preceding. And while it is
painfully true that in the slaveholding States far too many Christians
do still own slaves; it is equally true, that they bear a small
proportion to those who own none, even in those States. If we suppose
the Christians in America to be about on an equal footing as to wealth
with other people; and to have no more conscience about slavery, than
those around them in the slave States; and that twenty slaves may be
taken as the average, to each master; and a ninth of the people pious,
as stated before, it follows that only about 11,000 professors of
religion can be slaveholders; or about one in every hundred of the
whole number in the nation. Yet every one of the above suppositions is
against the churches, and yet upon this basis rests the charges of a
candid, affectionate Christian brother against them all! The only
remaining illustration of Mr. Thompson's proneness to represent a
little truth, in such a way as to have all the effects of an immense
misrepresentation, regards his own posture, doings and sufferings in
America. "Fourteen months of toil, of peril, and persecution, almost
unparalleled;" "there were paid myrmidons seeking my blood;" "there
were thousands waiting to rejoice over my destruction;" "when any
individual tells George Thompson who has put his life into his hands,
and gone where slavery is rife; when I, George Thompson, am told I am
to be spared," &c. Similar statements, ad infinitum, fill up all his
speeches; and are noticed now, not for the purpose of commenting on,
or even contradicting them, but of affording my countrymen, who may
chance to see the report of this discussion, specimens, as our
certificates often run "of the modesty, probity, and good demeanor,"
of the individual.

He would pass next to a fourth general objection against Mr.
Thompson's testimony, as regards America, whi