ABSTRACT
[First published in The World, 3 March 1788 and in The European Magazine, XIII, March 1788, pp. 219–20.] Of late I paus’d upon the Twilight Plain Of Fontenoy, 1 to weep the Free-Born Brave; Sure Fancy now may cross the * Western Main, And melt in sadder pity for the Slave, Lo! Where to yon Plantation drooping goes The Sable Herd of Human Kind, while near Stalks a pale Despot, and around him throws The scourge that wakes – that punishes the tear. O’er the far beach the mournful murmurs run, And join the rude yell of the tumbling tide, As faint they ply their labours in the sun, To feed the luxury of British Pride! E’en at this moment, on the burning gale Floats the weak wailing of the female tongue: And can that sex’s softnes nought avail- Must naked Woman shriek amid the throng? O cease to think, my Soul! What thousands die By suicide, and toil’s extreme despair; Thousands, who never rais’d to Heaven the eye, Thousands, who fear’d no punishment but there. 183Are Drops of Blood the Horrible Manure That fills with luscious juice the Teeming Cane? And must our Fellow Creatures thus endure, For traffic vile, th’ indignity of pain? Yes, their keen sorrows are the sweets we blend With the green bev’rage 2 of our Morning Meal, The wile to love meek Mercy we pretend Or for fictitious ills affect to feel. Yes, ’tis their anguish mantles in the bowl, Their sighs excite the Briton’s drunken joy; Those Ign’rant Suff’rers know not of a Soul, That we enlightened may its hopes destroy. And there are Men, who, leaning on the Laws, What they have purchas’d, claim a right to Hold – Curs’d be the tenure, curs’d its cruel cause – – Freedom’s a dearer Property than Gold! And there are Men with shameless front have said, That Nature form’d the Negroes for – disgrace; That on their limbs subjection is display’d – The doom of Slavery stampt upon their face. Send your stern gaze from Lapland to the Line, And ev’ry region’s natives fairly sean, Their forms, their force, their faculties, combine, And own the vast Variety of Man! Then why suppose Yourselves the chosen few To deal Oppression’s poison’d arrows round, To gall with iron bonds the weaker crew, Enforce the labour and inflict the wound? ’Tis sordid int’rest guides you: bent on gain, In profit only can ye reason find; And pleasure too – But urge no more in vain The selfish subject to the Social Mind. Ah! How can he whose daily lot is grief, Whose mind is vilified beneath the rod, Suppose his Maker has for him relief, Can he believe the tongue that speaks of God? For when he sees the female of his heart, And his lov’d daughters, torn by lust away, 184His sons, the poor inheritors of smart – – Had he Religion, think ye he could pray? Alas! He steals him from the loathsome shed, What time moist midnight blows her venom’d breath, And musing, how he long has toil’d and bled, Drinks the dire balsam of consoling death! Haste, haste, ye winds, on swiftest pinions fly, Ere from this world of misery he go, Tell him his wrongs bedew a Nation’s Eye, Tell him, Britannia blushes for his woe! Say, that in future Negroes shall be blest, Rank’d e’en as men, and Men’s just rights enjoy; Be neither Sold, nor Purchas’d, nor Oppress’d, No griefs shall wither, and no stripes destroy! Say, that Fair Freedom bends her holy flight To cheer the Infant, and console the Sire; So shall he, wond’ring, prove, at last, delight, And in a throb of ecstasy expire. Then shall proud Albion’s Crown, where laurels twine, Torn from the bosom of the raging sea, Boast, midst the glorious leaves a gem divine, The radiant gem of Pure Humanity.
