The speech was declared to be one of the ablest ever delivered before the House.  The speaker was also well sustained by Pitt and Fox.  Mr. Burke said of this performance,—­“The House, the nation, and Europe are under great and serious obligations to the honorable gentleman, for having brought forward the subject in a manner the most masterly, impressive, and eloquent.”  “It was,” said Bishop Porteus, who was present, “a glorious night for this country.”

The subject was now fairly afloat.  The anti-slavery agitation had sprung to a vigorous life.  The “irrepressible conflict” was begun.  Nor can it be denied that its beginning was highly respectable.  If there be any good in elevated social rank joined to distinguished ability, if there be any advantage in the favor of honorable and right-minded men, any dignity in British halls of legislation, the advocate of anti-slavery doctrines may claim alliance with them all.

One inevitable effect of the interest thus awakened was to render those enlisted in favor of the trade aware of their position, and alert to prevent any interference on the part of the Government.  The alarm spread.  The merchants of Liverpool and Bristol must maintain their ground.  In various quarters were set forth the advantages of the trade.  It was no injustice to the negro, but rather a benefit.  The trader was no robber or oppressor; he was a benefactor, in that by his means the native African was taken from a heathen land and brought to live among Christians.  At home, he was the victim of savage warfare; by the slave-ship his life was prolonged and his salvation rendered possible.

Witnesses on both sides were now summoned for examination before Parliamentary committees.  The premises from which conclusions had been drawn must be thoroughly sifted.  The evidence collected was manifold; to dispose of it required time, and with time the opponents of the Abolition Bill gathered strength.  The next year and the following its advocates still maintained its claims.  The third year of its presentation opened with high hopes of its success.  Its friends had increased in number, and so marked was the inferiority of their opponents in talents and influence, at this time, that the contest was known as “The War of the Pigmies against the Giants.”  But the pigmies, being numerous, gained the vote, and it only remained for the giants to return with renewed vigor to the contest in the following year.

In 1792 the debate began with spirit.  During this discussion Mr. Pitt was most prominent.  The great subject of the Resources of Africa had recently engaged his attention.  This subject, then an almost untried theme, seems not unlikely in our day to take precedence of all others in connection with the fate of the negro.  It has been argued, and that wisely, that only by strengthening the African at home can he ever be respected abroad.  In the productions of his native soil lie materials for trade vastly better than the buying and selling of men, women, and children.  The fomenting of wars, whereby captives may be secured, may well be superseded by the culture of the coffee-tree and the cotton-plant.