That the pretence of danger to our West Indian islands from the abolition of the Slave-trade was totally unfounded, Mr. Wilberforce had abundantly proved:  but if there were they, who had not been satisfied with that proof, was it possible to resist the arguments of Mr. Pitt on the same subject?  It had been shown, on a comparison of the births and deaths in Jamaica, that there was not now any decrease of the slaves.  But if there had been, it would have made no difference to him in his vote; for, had the mortality been ever so great there, he should have ascribed it to the system of importing Negros, instead of that of encouraging their natural increase.  Was it not evident, that the planters thought it more convenient to buy them fit for work, than to breed them?  Why, then, was this horrid trade to be kept up?—­To give the planters, truly, the liberty of misusing their slaves, so as to check population; for it was from ill-usage only that, in a climate so natural to them, their numbers could diminish.  The very ground, therefore, on which the planters rested the necessity of fresh importations, namely, the destruction of lives in the West Indies, was itself the strongest argument that could be given, and furnished the most imperious call upon parliament for the abolition of the trade.

Against this trade innumerable were the charges.  An honourable member, Mr. Smith, had done well to introduce those tragical stories, which had made such an impression upon the House.  No one of these had been yet controverted.  It had indeed been said, that the cruelty of the African captain to the child was too bad to be true; and we had been desired to look at the cross-examination of the witness, as if we should find traces of the falsehood of his testimony there.  But his cross-examination was peculiarly honourable to his character; for after he had been pressed, in the closest manner, by some able members of the House, the only inconsistency they could fix upon him was, whether the fact had happened on the same day of the same month of the year 1764 or the year 1765.

But it was idle to talk of the incredibility of such instances.  It was not denied, that absolute power was exercised by the slave-captains; and if this was granted, all the cruelties charged upon them would naturally follow.  Never did he hear of charges so black and horrible as those contained in the evidence on the table.  They unfolded such a scene of cruelty, that if the House, with all their present knowledge of the circumstances, should dare to vote for its continuance, they must have nerves, of which he had no conception.  We might find instances indeed, in history, of men violating the feelings of nature on extraordinary occasions.  Fathers had sacrificed their sons and daughters, and husbands their wives; but to imitate their characters we ought to have not only nerves as strong as the two Brutuses, but to take care that we had a cause as good; or that we had motives for such a dereliction of our feelings as patriotic as those, which historians had annexed to these when they handed them to the notice of the world.