First let me repeat your longest section relative to that people.
'Below this class of inhabitants, (the whites of no property, in Virginia,)
we must rank the Negroes, who would be still more to be pitied, if their
_natural insensibility did not in some measure alleviate the wretchedness
inseparable from slavery_. Seeing them ill lodged, ill clothed, and often
overcome with labour, I concluded that their treatment had been as rigorous
as it is elsewhere. Notwithstanding I have been assured that it is very
mild, compared to what they suffer in the Sugar Colonies. And indeed one
does not hear habitually, as at Jamaica and St. Domingo, the sound of
whips, and the outcries of the wretched beings, whose bodies are torn piece
meal by their strokes. It is because the people of Virginia are commonly
milder than those of the Sugar Colonies, which consist chiefly of rapacious
men, eager to amass fortunes, as soon as possible, and return to Europe.
The produce of their labours being also less valuable, their tasks are not
so rigorously exacted, and in justice to both, it must be allowed that the
Negroes themselves are less treacherous and thievish, than they are in the
Islands: for the propagation of the black species being very considerable
here, most of them are born in the country, and it is remarked that these
are in general less depraved than those imported from Africa. Besides, we
must do the Virginians the justice to remark, that many of them treat their
Negroes with a great deal of humanity, and what is still more to their
honor, they appear sorry there are any among them, and are forever talking
of abolishing slavery, and falling upon some other mode of improving their
land, &c.
'However this may be, it is fortunate that different motives concur to
deter mankind from exercising such tyranny, at least upon their own
species, if we cannot say, strictly speaking, _their equals_; for the more
we observe the Negroes, the more we are convinced that the
difference between us _does not lie in the colour alone, &c._
'Enough upon this subject, which has not escaped the attention of the
politicians and philosophers of the present age: I have only to apologize
for treating it without declamation; but I have always thought, that
eloquence can only influence the resolutions of the moment, and that every
thing which requires time, must be the work of reason. And besides, it will
be an easy matter to add ten or twelve pages to these few reflections,
which may be considered as a concert composed only of principal parts, _con
corni ad libertum_.'
Upon reading this passage attentively, I was surprised to find it contain a
singular mixture of contradictory principles, and in the same breath, the
sentiments of a philosopher and of a colonist; of an advocate for the
Negroes, and of their enemy.
It is evident that as a philosopher, and a friend to humanity, you are
inclined to alleviate the lot of the Negroes, and commend those who do so,
but this tenderness itself conceals a subtile venom that ought to be
exposed. For you only bestow your pity upon the Negroes, while you owe
them, if you are a philosopher, vindication and defense; you wish their
masters to be humane; they ought to be just. Instead of praising such
humanity, you ought to have blamed them for stopping there, in short, such
a contempt for the Negroes pervades this whole article, as will necessarily
encourage their tormentors to rivet their chains. Is not this contempt
observable, for instance in the very first period?
"Below this class of inhabitants (the meanest whites of Virginia) we must
rank the Negroes, who would be still more to be pitied, if their natural
insensibility did not in some measure alleviate the wretchedness
inseparable from slavery."
And who told you, Sir, that nature had created the Negroes with less
feeling than other men? do you judge so because they have vegetated for
three centuries in European fetters, and at this day have not altogether
shaken off the horrid yoke? But do not their frequent risings, and the
cruelties they from time to time retaliate upon their masters, give the lie
to this natural insensibility? for an insensible being has no resentment.
If he does not feel, how should he remember? Do you think the wretched
Indians, who, since the discovery of the New world, are burried in the
mines of Peru, are also naturally insensible, because they suffer
patiently?
You calumniate nature in making her grant favours to particulars; in giving
her a system of inequality among her offspring. All men are cast in the
same mould.--The varieties which distinguish individuals, are the sports of
chance, or the result of different circumstances; but the black comes into
the world with as much sensibility as the white, the Peruvian, as the
European.
What then degrades this natural and moral sensibility? The greater or less
privation of liberty; in proportion as man loses it, he loses the powers of
sensation; he loses the man; he sickens or becomes a brute. It is slavery
alone which can reduce a man to a level with the brute creation, and
sometimes deprives him of all sensibility; but you blame nature, that kind
parent, who would have us all equal, free and happy, for the crime of
social barbarity, and you pass by this crime, to extenuate another, to
extenuate the horrid torments of slavery! Not satisfied with violating
nature, by abusing her offspring, even in her name, you encourage
slaveholders to torment them.
Do you not arm their tyrants, when you tell them, the insensibility of the
Negroes alleviates their torments?
What! because greatness of soul raised Sidney above the terrors of death,
the infernal Jefferies[1] who caused his execution, was less guilty!
because the Quakers appeared insensible to insults, blows, or punishments,
they are less to be pitied, and it was right to martyr them! A dangerous
notion, whose consequences I am sure you would disapprove. If this
insensibility with which you reproach the Negroes mitigated the cruelty of
their masters, it were well: but their tormentors do not wish them not to
feel; they would have them all feeling, for the pleasure of torturing them;
and their punishments are increased in proportion to their insensibility.
Seeing the Negroes, say you, "Ill lodged, ill cloathed, and often overcome
with labour, I concluded that their treatment had been as rigorous as it is
elsewhere. Notwithstanding I have been assured that it is very mild,
compared to what they suffer in the Sugar Colonies."
Why this comparison, which seems to insinuate a justification of the
Virginians? does a misfortune cease to be such, because there is a greater
elsewhere? Was Cartouche less detestable because Brinvilliers had existed
before him? Let us not weaken by comparisons the idea of criminality, nor
lessen the attention due to the miserable, this were to countenance the
crime. The Negroes are ill lodged, ill cloathed, oppressed with labour in
Virginia: this is the fact, this is the offence. It matters not whether
they are worse treated elsewhere; in whatever degree they are so in
Virginia, it is still outrage and injustice.
And again, why are the Negroes of Virginia less cruelly treated? Humanity
is not the motive, it is because covetousness cannot obtain so much from
their labours, as in the Sugar Islands. Was it otherwise, they would be
sacrificed to it here, as well as there; how can we praise such forced
humanity? how, on the contrary, not give vent to all the indignation, which
must naturally arise in every feeling mind?
"And to do justice to both, you add, if the Virginians are not so severe,
it is because the Negroes themselves are less treacherous and thievish than
in the islands, because the propagation of the black species being very
considerable here, most of the Negroes are born in the country, and it is
remarked, that these are in general less depraved than those imported from
Africa."
Here is a strange confusion of causes and effects, and a strange abuse of
words. First let us clear up the facts. Here are some valuable ones for the
cause of the Negroes.
You say they are not so thievish in Virginia, propagate faster, and are
less depraved: Why? Because they are less cruelly treated.--Here is the
cause and the effect, you have mistaken one for the other.
We must conclude from this fact, that if the Virginians were no longer
severe, and should treat the blacks like fellow-creatures, they would not
be more vicious than their white servants.
The degree of oppression is the measure of what is improperly called the
viciousness of the slaves.--The more cruel their tyrants, the more
treacherous, villainous and cruel are the slaves in return--Can we wonder
that Macronius should assassinate his master Tiberius? This viciousness is
a punishment that heaven inflicts upon tyranny.
Can the efforts of a slave for the recovery of his liberty, be denominated
vicious or criminal? From the moment you violate the laws of nature, in
regard to them, why should not they shake them off in their relative duties
to you? You rob them of liberty, and you would not have them steal your
gold! You whip and cruelly torment them, and expect them not to struggle
for deliverance! You assassinate them every day, and expect them not to
assassinate you once! You call your outrages, rights, and the courage which
repulses them, a crime! What a confusion of ideas! what horrid logic!
And you, sir, a humane philosopher! are accessory to this injustice, by
describing the blacks in the style of a dealer in human flesh! You call
what are no more than natural consequences of the compression of the spring
of liberty--treachery, theft and depravation.[2] But can a natural
consequence be criminal? Remove the cause or is it not the only crime?
For my part, sir, I firmly believe, that the barbarities committed by the
Negroes, not merely against their masters, but even against others, will be
attributed at the bar of eternal justice, to the slaveholders, and those
infamous persons employed in the Guinea trade. I firmly believe, that no
human justice has the right of putting a Negro slave to death for any crime
whatever, because not being free, he is not sui juris, and should be
regarded as a child or an idiot, being almost always under the lash. I
believe that the real criminal, the cause of the crime, is the man who
first seized him, sold him, or enslaved him.--And if ever I should fall
under the knife of an unhappy runaway, I would not resent it upon him but
upon those white men who keep blacks in slavery. I would tell them, your
cruelty towards your Negroes, has endangered my life--they execrate you,
they take me for a tyrant because I am white like you, and the vengeance
due to your crimes has fallen upon me.
God forbid, however, that I should undertake to encourage the blacks to
take up arms against their masters! God forbid, however, that I should
undertake to justify the excesses to which their resentments have sometimes
hurried them, and which have often fallen on persons who were not accessary
to their wretchedness! The slavery under which they groan, must be
abolished by peaceable means; and thanks to the active spirit of
benevolence which animates the Quakers, the pious undertaking is already
begun. In most of the United States of America, the yoke has been taken
from their necks; in others the Guinea-trade has been prohibited. Societies
have been formed both at Paris and London, to collect and circulate
information upon this interesting subject, to induce the European
governments to put a stop to the Negro trade, and provide for their gradual
emancipation in the West-India islands: No doubt success will crown their
views, and the friends of liberty will enjoy the satisfaction of
communicating its blessings to the blacks.
But the blacks must wait for the happy moment that shall restore them to
civil life, in silence and in peace; they must rely upon the unwearied
diligence and zeal of the numerous writers who advocate their cause, and
the efforts of the humane to second their endeavors; they must strive to
justify and support the arguments that are adduced in their favour, by
displaying virtue in the very bosom of slavery; they must endeavour, in a
word, to render themselves worthy of liberty, that they may know how to use
it when it shall be restored to them; for liberty itself is sometimes a
burden, when slavery has stupefied the soul.
Such blacks, therefore, as are so inconsiderate as to be concerned in
insurrections, are guilty of retarding the execution of the general plan
for their emancipation; for the question is not, at the present day,
whether a million of slaves ought to be set at liberty, but whether they
can when free, be put into a capacity of providing for the subsistence of
themselves and their families. Insurrections, far from effecting this
purpose, would destroy the means. Regard, therefore, to their own
interests, if there were no other motive, should therefore engage the
blacks to patient submission, and no doubt but they will yield it, if their
masters and the ministers of the gospel in particular, to whom the task of
comforting and instructing them, is committed, endeavour to prepare them
for approaching freedom.
You sir, have adopted the vulgar notion, that the Negroes born in Virginia,
are less depraved than those imported from Africa. You call the firmness
which is common in the early stages of their slavery _greater degeneracy;_
they are depraved, that is, in your language--they are wicked and
treacherous to those who have purchased them, or brought them from their
own country.--But in my mind, they are not depraved, because the acts of
violence their genius inspires them to revenge themselves upon their
tyrants, are justified by the rights of nature.
And why are those imported, more wicked in your opinion? In mine, more
quick, more ardent in their resentments? because, not having forgotten
their former situation, they feel their loss the more sensibly; and having
strong ideas, their resolutions are more firm and their actions more
violent, they not having yet contracted the habits of slavery.
They soon fall into that degree of apathy and insensibility, which you
unjustly believe to be natural to them; that is, in your language, they
become less depraved; but I would say that their depravity begins with this
apathy and weakness.--For depravity is the loss of nature, and the want of
those virtues inherent in man, courage and the love of liberty. Our readers
may judge from this article, how strangely writers have wrested words to
condemn these unhappy Negroes, and the unfortunate in general.
I do not, however, pretend to say, that the Negroes of Africa are all
good, or even that many of them are not depraved. But is this fact to be
imputed to them as a personal crime? Ought you not rather to have ascribed
it to the foreign source by which they are corrupted. Alike in them and in
the whites, the depravity of man is a consequence of his wretchedness, and
the usurpation of his rights. Wherever he is free and at ease, he is good;
wherever the contrary, he is wicked. Neither his nature nor the climate
corrupt him, but the government of his country. Now that of the Negroes is
almost universally despotic, such as must necessarily debase and corrupt
the Negro.
How much is the depravity, occasioned by the government of his country,
increased by his second slavery, far worse than the first--for he is no
longer among friends in his native land--surrounded by the pleasing scenes
of his childhood, he is among monsters who are going to live by, and trade
in his blood, and has nothing before his eyes but death, or oppression
equivalent to an endless punishment.
How is it possible such horrid prospects should not fire his soul? How, if
chance should present him with arms and liberty, should he resist using
them, to put an end to his own existence, or that of his tormentors? What
white man would be less cruel in his situation? Truly I think myself of a
humane disposition, that I love my fellow-creatures and detest the effusion
of blood, but if ever a villain, white or black, should snatch me from my
freedom, my family, and my friends, should overwhelm me with outrages and
blows, to gratify his caprice, should extend his barbarities to my wife and
children--my blood boils at the thought--perhaps in a transport of
revenge.... If such vengeance would be lawful in me, what makes the Negro
more guilty? Why should that be called wickedness and depravity in him,
which would be stiled virtue in me, in you, in every white man? Are not my
rights the same as his? Is not nature our common parent? God his father as
well as mine? His conscience an infallible guide as well as mine? Let us
then no longer make other laws for the blacks than those we are bound by
ourselves, since Heaven has placed them on a level with us, has made them
like us, since they are our brethren and our fellow-creatures.
Here you stop me, you say that _the Negro is not our fellow-creature, that
he is below the white_.
How could so shocking an opinion escape the pen of a member of the Royal
Academy, a writer who would be thought a friend of mankind!
Do not you see the tormentors of St. Domingo, avail themselves of it
already, redoubling their strokes, and regarding their slaves as mere
machines, like the Cartesians do the brutes? They are not our
fellow-creatures will they say: a philosopher of Paris has proved it?
What! the blacks our equals! Have not they eyes, ears, a shape, and organs
like ours? Does nature follow another order, other laws for them?--Have not
they speech, that peculiar characteristic of humanity? But then the colour!
What of that? Are the pale white Albinos, the olive or copper coloured
Indians also of different species! Who does not know that colour is
accidental. They are not our equals! Have not they the same
faculties--reason, memory, imagination? Yes, you reply, but they have
written no books. Who told you so? Who told you there were no learned
blacks? And supposing it were so, if none but authors are men, the whole
human race is different from us.
Shall I tell you why there are no authors or men of learning among the
Negroes? What has made you what you are? Education and circumstances!--Now
where are the Negroes favoured by either? Consider them wherever they are
to be found.--In Africa, wretchedly enslaved by domestic tyrants; in our
islands perpetual martyrs; in the southern United States, the meanest of
slaves; in the northern, domestics; in Europe, universally contemned, every
where proscribed, like the Jews; in a word, every where in a state of
debasement.
I have been told that there are blacks of property in the northern parts of
America; but these, like the other settlers, are no more than sensible
farmers or traders.--There are no authors[3] among them, because there are
few rich and idle people in America.
What spring of action could raise a Negro from his debased condition? the
road to glory and honor is impassible to him: What then should he write
for? Besides, the blacks have reason to detest the sciences, for their
oppressors cultivate them but they do not make them better.
Shall we say that the Indians or Arabs are not our equals, because they
despise both our arts and our sciences? or the Quakers, because they
neither respect academies nor wits?
In short, if you will deny the Negroes souls, energy, sensibility,
gratitude or beneficence, I oppose you to yourself, I might quote your own
anecdote of Mr. Langdon's Negro, and abundance of other well known facts in
favour of the blacks. You may find some striking ones in the Abbé Raynals'
philosophical history. One of them would have been sufficient. The Negro
who killed himself when his master who had injured him was in his power,
was superior to Epictetus, and the existence of a single Negro of so
sublime a character, ennobles all his kind.
But how could you judge whether the blacks were different from the whites,
who saw them only in a state of slavery and wretchedness? Do we estimate
beauty by the figure of a Laplander? magnanimity by the soul of a courtier?
or intelligence by the stupidity of an Esquimaux?
If the traces of humanity were so much weakened and effaced in the Negroes,
that you did not recognize them, I conclude not that they do not belong to
our species, but that they must have been cruelly tormented to reduce them
to this state of degeneracy. I do not conclude that they are not men, but
that the Europeans who kidnap the blacks, are not worthy of the name.
You consider what precautions it may be necessary to take to avoid the
danger which might attend a general emancipation of the Negroes.
I shall not now enter into a discussion of this nice question, but reserve
it for another work: yet I must say in a word, that the Negroes will never
be our friends, will never be men, until they are possessed of all our
rights, until we are upon an equality. Civil liberty is the boundary
between good and evil, order and disorder, happiness and misery, ignorance
and knowledge. If we would make the Negroes worthy of us, we must raise
them to our level by giving them this liberty.
Thus, the chief inconvenience you expect will follow the emancipation of
the Negroes, may be avoided; that although free, they will remain a
distinct species, a distinct and dangerous body.
This objection will vanish when we intermix with them, and boldly efface
every distinction. Unless this is the case, I foresee torrents of blood
spilt and the earth disputed between the whites and blacks, as America was
between the Europeans and Savages.
Perhaps, and it is no extravagant idea--perhaps it might be more prudent,
more humane, to send the blacks back again to their native country, settle
them there, encourage their industry, and assist them to form connections
with Europe and America. The celebrated doctor Fothergill conceived this
plan, and the society for the abolition of slavery, at London, have carried
it into execution at Sierra Leone. Time and perseverance, will discover the
policy and utility of this settlement. If it should succeed, the blacks
will quit America insensibly, and Sierra Leone become the centre from
whence general civilization will spread over all Africa.
Perhaps, sir, you will place these thoughts upon the Negroes with those
declamations you are pleased to ridicule: But what is the epithet of
declaimer to me, if I am right, if I make an impression upon my readers, if
I cause remorse into the breast of a single slave-holder; in a word, if I
contribute to accelerate the general impulse toward liberty.
You disapprove the application of eloquence to this subject; you think
nothing can affect it but exertions of cool reason. What is eloquence but
the language of reason and sensibility? When man is oppressed, he
struggles, he complains, he moves our passions, and bears down all
opposition. Such eloquence can perform wonders, and should be employed by
those who undertake to plead the cause of the unfortunate who spend their
days in continual agony, or he will make no impression.--I do not conceive
how any man can display wit instead of feeling, upon this distracting
subject, amuse with an antithesis, instead of forcible reasoning, and only
dazzle where he ought to warm. I have no conception how a sensible and
thinking being, can see a fellow-creature tortured and torn to pieces,
perhaps his poor wife bathed in tears, with a wretched infant sucking her
shriveled breast at his side; I say I have no conception how he can behold
such a sight, with indifference; how, unagonized and convulsed with rage
and indignation, he can have the barbarity to descend to jesting!
Notwithstanding, your observations upon the Negroes, conclude with a jest.
It will be an easy matter, say you, to add ten or twelve pages to these few
reflections, which may be considered as a concert, composed only of
principal parts, "con corni ad Libertum."
I hope there is nothing cruel, because there is nothing studied in this
connection, this inconsiderate manner: but how could such a comparison come
into the head of a man of feeling? It is the sad effect of wit, as I said
before; it contracts the soul. Ever glancing over agreeable objects, it is
unfeeling when intruded upon by wretchedness--uneasy to obliterate the
shocking idea, and elude the groans of nature, it rids itself of both by a
jest. The humane Benezet would never have connected this idea of harmony
with the sound of a Negro driver's whip.
Having proved that you have wronged the Quakers and the Negroes, I shall
proceed to shew that you have equally injured mankind and the
people.--_Critical Examination of the Marquis de Chastellux's Travels in
North-America, 1782. Translated from the French of Jean P. Verre Brissot de
Warville, 1788_, pp. 51-63.