puniſhes any Negro or Molatto for ſtriking a Christian, by whipping at the diſcretion of the Juſtices before whom he may be convicted. It alſo prohibits marriage of Chriſtians with Negroes or Molattoes—and impoſes a penalty of Fifty Pounds upon the perſons joining them in marriage. It provides againſt unreaſonable denial of marriage to Negroes with thoſe of the fame nation, by any Maſter—"any Law, Uſage, or Cuſtom, to the contrary notwithſtanding.
This proviſo againſt the unreaſonable denial of marriage to negroes is very intereſting. Legiſlation againſt the arbitrary exerciſe and abuſe of authority proves its exiſtence and the previous practice. It was as true then as it is now that the inſtitution of ſlavery was inconſiſtent with the juſt rules of Chriſtian morality.
In Pennſylvania, five years before, William Penn had propoſed to his Council, "the neceſſitie of a law [among others] about ye marriages of negroes." The ſubject was referred to a committee of both houſes of the legiſlature, and reſulted in a Bill in the Aſſembly, "for regulating Negroes in their Morals and Marriages, etc.," which was twice read and rejected. Penn. Col. Rec, i. 598. 606. Votes of Aſſembly, i., 120, 121. This propoſition of Penn was in accordance with the views of George Fox, whoſe teſtimony in regard to the treatment of ſlaves, given at Barbadoes in 1671, is elſewhere referred to in these notes. In his "Goſpel Family Order, being a ſhort diſcourſe concerning the Ordering of Families, both of Whites, Blacks, and Indians," he particularly enforced the neceſſity of
