The following extract from Clarkson's "Memoirs of the Public and Private
Life of William Penn," will show how the society of Friends, at a very
early period, became unwarily entangled with the practice of slave
holding; and also that the unchristian nature of it was immediately
perceived by the more spiritual minded among them. It will serve also to
prove that the testimony of Friends against slavery is no novelty, but
is coeval with its rise as a distinct religious body. The measures
proposed by William Penn on this subject, are an honorable testimony to
the comprehensive benevolence of that truly great and magnanimous
legislator, yet they fell short of the exigencies of the case, and of
what Christian people required; consequently what good they directly
effected was local and temporary. Viewed as the germ of subsequent
anti-slavery enterprises of the last century, in Europe and America,
their interest and importance cannot be too highly estimated.
"I must observe, that soon after the colony (Pennsylvania) had
been planted, that is, in the year 1682, when William Penn was
first resident in it, some few Africans had been imported, but
that more had followed. At this time the traffic in slaves was
not branded with infamy, as at the present day. It was
considered, on the other hand, as favorable to both parties: to
the American planters, because they had but few laborers, in
comparison with the extent of their lands; and to the poor
Africans themselves, because they were looked upon as persons
redeemed out of superstition, idolatry, and heathenism. But
though the purchase and sale of them had been admitted with less
caution upon this principle, there were not wanting among the
Quakers of Pennsylvania those who, soon after the introduction
of them there, began to question the moral licitness of the
traffic. Accordingly, at the Yearly Meeting for Pennsylvania,
held in 1688, it had been resolved, on the suggestion of
emigrants from Crisheim, who had adopted the principles of
William Penn, that the buying, selling, and holding men in
slavery, was inconsistent with the tenets of the Christian
religion. In 1696, a similar resolution had been passed at the
Yearly Meeting of the same religious society for the same
province. In consequence, then, of these noble resolutions, the
Quakers had begun to treat their slaves in a different manner
from that of other people. They had begun to consider them as
children of the same great Parent, to whom fraternal offices
were due; and hence, in 1698, there were instances where they
had admitted them into their meeting houses to worship in common
with themselves.[A]
[Footnote A: "I cannot help copying into a note an anecdote from
Thomas Story's Journal for this year (1698). 'On the 13th,' says
he, 'we had a pretty large meeting, where several were tendered,
among whom were some negroes. And here I shall observe, that
Thomas Simons having several negroes, one of them, as also
several belonging to Henry White, had of late come to meetings,
and having a sense of truth, several others thereway were
likewise convinced, and like to do well. And the morning that we
came from Thomas Simons's, my companion speaking some words of
truth to his negro woman, she was tendered; and as I passed on
horseback by the place where she stood weeping, I gave her my
hand, and then she was much more broken: and finding the day of
the Lord's tender visitation and mercy upon her, I spake
encouragingly to her, and was glad to find the poor blacks so
near the truth and reachable.' She stood there, looking after us
and weeping, as long as we could see her. I had inquired of one
of the black men how long they had come to meetings, and he said
'they had always been kept in ignorance, and disregarded as
persons who were not to expect any thing from the Lord, till
Jonathan Taylor, who had been there the year before, discoursing
with them, had informed them that the grace of God, through
Christ, was given also to them; and that they ought to believe
in and be led and taught by it, and so might come to be good
Friends, and saved as well as others. And on the next occasion,
which was when William Ellis and Aaron Atkinson were there, they
went to meetings, and several of them were convinced.' Thus one
planteth and another watereth, but God giveth the increase."]
"William Penn was highly gratified by the consideration of what
has been done on this important subject. From the very first
introduction of enslaved Africans into this province, he had
been solicitous about their temporal and eternal welfare. He had
always considered them as persons of the like nature with
himself; as having the same desire of pleasure and the same
aversion from pain; as children of the same Father, and heirs of
the same promises. Knowing how naturally the human heart became
corrupted and hardened by the use of power, he was fearful lest,
in time, these friendless strangers should become an oppressed
people. Accordingly, as his predecessor, George Fox, when he
first visited the British West Indies, exhorted all those who
attended his meetings for worship there, to consider their
slaves as branches of their own families, for whose spiritual
instruction they would one day or other be required to give an
account, so William Penn had, on his first arrival in America,
inculcated the same notion. It lay, therefore, now upon his mind
to endeavor to bring into practice what had appeared to him to
be right in principle. One of them was to try to incorporate the
treatment of slaves, as a matter of Christian duty, into _the
discipline of his own religious society_; and the other, to
secure it among others in the colony of a different religious
description, _by a legislative act_. Both of these were
necessary. The former, however, he resolved to attempt first.
The Society itself had already afforded him a precedent, by its
resolutions in 1688 and in 1696, as before mentioned, and had
thereby done something material in the progress of the work. It
was only to get a minute passed upon their books to the intended
effect. Accordingly, at the very first Monthly Meeting of the
Society, which took place in Philadelphia in the present year,
he proposed the subject. He laid before them the concern which
had been so long upon his mind, relative to these unfortunate
people; he pressed upon them the duty of allowing them as
frequently as possible to attend their Meetings for worship, and
the benefit that would accrue to both, by the instruction of
them in the principles of the Christian religion. The result
was, that a Meeting was appointed more particularly for the
negroes, once every month; so that besides the common
opportunities they had of collecting religious knowledge, by
frequenting the places of worship, there was one day in the
month, in which, as far as the influence of the Monthly Meeting
extended, they could neither be temporally nor spiritually
overlooked. At this Meeting also, he proposed means, which were
acceded to, for a more frequent intercourse between Friends and
the Indians; he (William Penn,) taking upon himself the charge
of procuring interpreters, as well as of forwarding the means
proposed."--Vol. II. pp. 218-222.