ANTI-SLAVERY
MONTHLY REPORTER.
1. DR. BURGESS, THE PRESENT BISHOP OF SALISBURY, ON COLONIAL SLAVERY.
2. APPEAL TO THE BENCH OF BISHOPS ON COLONIAL SLAVERY, BY GRANVILLE SHARPE.
3. FRESH ATROCITIES IN BERBICE.
4. RECENT INTELLIGENCE FROM JAMAICA.
1. Colonial policy at the present crisis.
2. Conduct pursued towards missionaries.
5. CAPE OF GOOD HOPE—SOCIETY FOR REDEEMING SLAVES.
1. Dr. Burgess, the present Bishop of Salisbury, on Colonial Slavery.
In our last Number we adduced the testimony of many distinguishedprelates of the Church of England against the evils of Slavery. Thereremains one living Prelate whom it would be unpardonable for us toomit; we mean the present Bishop of Salisbury, Dr. Burgess. In theyear 1789, this learned and excellent person published a pamphlet,which we fear has been long out of print, and is only now to be foundin such libraries as that of the British Museum, entitled, “Considerationson the abolition of Slavery, and the Slave Trade, upon grounds ofnatural, religious, and political duty.” A Liverpool Clergyman of thename of Harris, had published a pamphlet in defence of slavery, whichhe represented as a dispensation of Providence,—a state of society recognisedby the Gospel;—in which the reciprocal duties of mastersand slaves are founded on the principle of both being servants of Christ,and are enforced by the Divine rules of Christian charity. The followingare some of the indignant observations of the good Bishop, on witnessingsuch a prostitution of the sacred truths and obligations of religion:—
“Reciprocal duties!” he exclaims, “Reciprocal duties!—To have an adequatesense of the propriety of these terms, we must forget the humane provisions ofthe Hebrew law, as well as the liberal indulgence of Roman slavery, and thinkonly of West India slavery! of unlimited, uncompensated, brutal slavery, andthen judge what reciprocity there can be between absolute authority and absolutesubjection; and how the Divine rule of Christian charity can be said to enforcethe reciprocal duties of the West India slave and his master. Reciprocity is inconsistentwith every degree of real slavery.” “Slavery cannot be called one ofthe species of civil subordination. A slave is a non-entity in civil society.”“Law and slavery are contradictory terms.”
The Bishop’s treatise is one among many proofs that the Abolitionistsfrom the first contemplated the ultimate extinction of slavery as the endof their labours.
“Such oppression,” says the Bishop, (meaning the state of slavery), “andsuch traffic” (meaning the slave trade), “must be swept away at one blow. Suchhorrid offences against God and nature can admit of no medium. Yet some ofthe more moderate apologists of slavery think that a medium may be adopted.434They think th