of them after they are emancipated. This has always been the difficult point, with the reflecting: and those who study the subject thoroughly, will always be met by this difficulty. The danger of setting afloat in the community so vast a discordant element as a body of three millions of people, — and the number continually increasing, — who, in the nature of things, can never amalgamate with the general mass, — might well trouble, as it has troubled, the minds of the wisest statesmen and thinkers of America. And in the contemplation of it, they have been almost driven to despair for their country; and have felt disposed to "curse the day" when Britain, in her selfish disregard of the future and the rights of others, and in her eagerness for gain, introduced this terrible evil into her colonies. This difficulty, moreover, has been, in the minds of many,
him to emancipate his slaves. He feels the evils of slavery as strongly, and perhaps, more so, than you can feel them; and who can say that he has not as much benevolence in his heart as we in ours? The laws of his State, framed according to the dictates of the best judgment of legislators, forbid emancipation, except under certain restrictions, which are deemed absolutely necessary to prevent pauperism, wretchedness, and crime, and utter min: and here are human beings dependent upon him for protection, and government, and support. The relation he did not voluntarily assume. He was born the legal proprietor of his slaves, as much as he was born the subject of civil government, — and it is his duty, and a duty which he cannot well avoid, to make the best provision for them in his power. Too frequently, it would be just as humane, to throw them overboard at sea, as to set them free in this country. Moreover, if he turn them out to shift for themselves, he turns out upon the community those who will in all probability become, most of them, vagabonds, paupers, felons, a pest to society. He will tell you, that as a Christian, as a patriot, as a philanthropist, as an honest man, and a humane friend of the blacks, he finds insuperable obstacles to the accomplishment of what you propose." — Plea for Africa, Conversation VIII.
