assage of the act of 1782 allowing manumission and the
year 1791, more than ten thousand slaves had been set free. One is tempted
to believe that the new Massachusetts school caught its fire from this old
Virginia school; for this friend of Jefferson speaks of "the inconsistency
of invoking God for liberty in our Revolution and imposing on our
fellow-men who differ from us in complexion a slavery ten thousand times
more cruel than the grievances and oppressions of which we complained."
Such was the utterance of the Virginia school of statesmanship in which
Jefferson was trained.

And his views progressed, as we should expect. On the occasion of a call
for instructions to the first Virginia delegates to Congress respecting an
address to the King, Jefferson drew up a paper, which, though greatly
admired, was thought too bold. In one passage he goes beyond his masters,
and says,--"For the most trifling reasons, and sometimes for no
conceivable reasons at all, his Majesty has rejected laws of the most
salutary tendency. _The abolition of domestic slavery is the great object
of desire in these Colonies, where it was unhappily introduced in their
infant state._ But, previous to the enfranchisement of the slaves we have,
it is necessary to exclude all further importations from Africa. Yet our
repeated efforts to effect this, by prohibiting and by imposing duties
which might amount to prohibition, have been hitherto defeated by his
Majesty's negative,--thus preferring the advantages of a few British
corsairs to the lasting interests of the American States, and to the
rights of human nature, deeply wounded by this infamous practice."

These words are hot and bright, but they are mere sparkles compared to the
full-flaming orb of freedom which our statesman gave afterward. For, take
the Declaration of Independence, as it issued from Carpenter's Hall, after
slavery-loving planters of the South and money-loving ship-owners of the
North had, as they thought, made it neutral, and we all, North and South,
recognize in it the boldest anti-slavery document extant. Why else do
Northern demagogues ridicule it, and Southern demagogues revile it? Yet
Jefferson made it far stronger and sharper against negro slavery than it
is now. Look closely at the well-known fac-simile:--

[Transcriber's note: in this quotation, _text_ is underlined;
#text# is struck through]

he has waged cruel war against human nature itself, violating it's m