Page:The African Slave Trade (Clark).djvu/51

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WESLEY'S THOUGHTS ON SLAVERY.
47

parents, and parents from their children; husbands from their wives; wives from their beloved husbands; brethren and sisters from each other. You have dragged them who have never one you any wrong, in chains, and forced them into the vilest slavery, never to end but with life; such slavery as is not found among the Turks in Algiers, nor among the heathens in America. You induce the villain to steal, rob, murder men, women, and children, without number, by paying him for his execrable labor. It is all your act and deed. your conscience quite reconciled to this? Does it never reproach you at all? Has gold entirely blinded your eyes, and stupefied your heart? Can you see, can you feel no harm therein? Is it doing as you would be done to? Make the case your own. 'Master,' said a slave at Liverpool, to the merchant that owned him, 'what if some of my countrymen were to come here, and take away mistress, and Tommy, and Billy, and carry them into our country, and make them slaves, how would you like it? 'His answer as worthy of a man 'I will never buy a slave more while live.' Let his resolution be yours. Have no more any part in this detestable business. Instantly leave it to those unfeeling wretches ' who laugh at human nature and compassion.' Be you a man; not a wolf, a devourer of the human species. Be merciful, that you may obtain mercy.

"Is there a God? You know there is. Is he a just God? hen there must be a state of retribution; a state wherein the just God will reward every man according to his works, then what reward will he render to you? Oh, think betimes, before you drop into eternity! Think now. 'He shall have judgment without mercy that hath showed no mercy.' Are you a man? Then you should have a human heart. But have you, indeed? What is your heart made of? Is there no such principle as compassion there? Do