Thus, on which ever supposition it is founded, the whole argument must fall.  And indeed it is impossible that it can stand, even in the eye of common sense.  For if you admit the form of men as a justification of slavery, you may subjugate your own brother:  if features, then you must quarrel with all the world:  if colour, where are you to stop?  It is evident, that if you travel from the equator to the northern pole, you will find a regular gradation of colour from black to white.  Now if you can justly take him for your slave, who is of the deepest die, what hinders you from taking him also, who only differs from the former but by a shade.  Thus you may proceed, taking each in a regular succession to the poles.  But who are you, that thus take into slavery so many people?  Where do you live yourself?  Do you live in Spain, or in France, or in Britain?  If in either of these countries, take care lest the whiter natives of the north should have a claim upon yourself.—­But the argument is too ridiculous to be farther noticed.

Having now silenced the whole argument, we might immediately proceed to the discussion of other points, without even declaring our opinion as to which of the suppositions may be right, on which it has been refuted; but we do not think ourselves at liberty to do this.  The present age would rejoice to find that the scriptures had no foundation, and would anxiously catch at the writings of him, who should mention them in a doubtful manner.  We shall therefore declare our sentiments, by asserting that they are true, and that all mankind, however various their appearances are derived from the same stock.

To prove this, we shall not produce those innumerable arguments, by which the scriptures have stood the test of ages, but advert to a single fact.  It is an universal law, observable throughout the whole creation, that if two animals of a different species propagate, their offspring is unable to continue its own species.  By this admirable law, the different species are preserved distinct; every possibility of confusion is prevented, and the world is forbidden to be over-run by a race of monsters.  Now, if we apply this law to those of the human kind, who are said to be of a distinct species from each other, it immediately fails.  The mulattoe is as capable of continuing his own species as his father; a clear and irrefragable proof, that the scripture[077] account of the creation is true, and that “God, who hath made the world, hath made of one blood[078] all the nations of men that dwell on all the face of the earth.”

But if this be the case, it will be said that mankind were originally of one colour; and it will be asked at the same time, what it is probable that the colour was, and how they came to assume so various an appearance?  To, each of these we shall make that reply, which we conceive to be the most rational.