As to the mode of obtaining slaves, it had been suggested as the least disreputable, that they became so in consequence of condemnation as criminals.  But he would judge of the probability of this mode by the reasonableness of it.  No less than eighty thousand Africans were exported annually by the different nations of Europe from their own country.  Was it possible to believe that this number could have been legally convicted of crimes, for which they had justly forfeited their liberty?  The supposition was ridiculous.  The truth was, that every enormity was practised to obtain the persons of these unhappy people; He referred those present to the case in the evidence of the African trader, who had kidnapped and sold a girl, and who was afterwards kidnapped and sold himself.  He desired them to reason upon the conversation which had taken place between the trader and the captain of the ship on this occasion.  He desired them also to reason upon the instance mentioned this evening, which had happened in the river Cameroons, and they would infer all the rapine, all the desolation, and all the bloodshed, which had been placed to the account of this execrable trade.

An attempt had been made to impress the House with the horrible scenes which had taken place in St. Domingo, as an argument against the abolition of the Slave Trade; but could any more weighty argument be produced in its favour?  What were the causes of the insurrections there?  They were two.  The first was the indecision of the National Assembly, who wished to compromise between that which was right and that which was wrong on this subject.  And the second was the oppression of the people of colour, and of the slaves.  In the first of the causes we saw something like the moderation of Mr. Dundas and Mr. Addington.  One day this Assembly talked of liberty, and favoured the Blacks.  Another day they suspended their measures and favoured the Whites.  They wished to steer a middle course; but decision had been mercy.  Decision even against the planters would have been a thousand times better than indecision and half measures.  In the mean time, the people of colour took the great work of justice into their own hands.  Unable, however, to complete this of themselves, they called in the aid of the slaves.  Here began the second cause; for the slaves, feeling their own power, began to retaliate on the Whites.  And here it may be observed, that, in all revolutions, the clemency or cruelty of the victors will always be in proportion to their former privileges, of their oppression.  That the slaves then should have been guilty of great excesses, was not to be wondered at; for where did they learn their cruelty?  They learnt it from those who had tyrannized over them.  The oppression, which they themselves had suffered, was fresh in their memories, and this had driven them to exercise their vengeance so furiously.  If we wished to prevent similar scenes in our own islands, we must reject all moderate measures, and at once abolish the Slave Trade.  By doing this, we should procure a better treatment for the slaves there; and when this happy change of system should have taken place, we might depend on them for the defence of the islands as much as on the whites themselves.