petitioned parliament against its continuance, sensible that
it is as impolitic as it is unjust--and what is inhuman must
ever be unwise.

Your Majesty's reign has been hitherto distinguished by
private acts of benevolence and bounty; surely the more
extended the misery is, the greater claim it has to your
Majesty's compassion, and the greater must be your Majesty's
pleasure in administering to its relief.

I presume, therefore, gracious Queen, to implore your
interposition with your royal consort, in favour of the
wretched Africans; that, by your Majesty's benevolent
influence, a period may now be put to their misery; and that
they may be raised from the condition of brutes, to which
they are at present degraded, to the rights and situation of
freemen, and admitted to partake of the blessings of your
Majesty's happy government; so shall your Majesty enjoy the
heartfelt pleasure of procuring happiness to millions, and
be rewarded in the grateful prayers of themselves, and of
their posterity.

And may the all-bountiful Creator shower on your Majesty,
and the Royal Family, every blessing that this world can
afford, and every fulness of joy which divine revelation has
promised us in the next.

I am your Majesty's most dutiful and devoted servant to
command,

Gustavus Vassa,
The Oppressed Ethiopean.

No. 53, Baldwin's Gardens.

*       *       *       *       *

The negro consolidated act, made by the assembly of Jamaica last year,
and the new act of amendment now in agitation there, contain a proof
of the existence of those charges that have been made against the
planters relative to the treatment of their slaves.

I hope to have the satisfaction of seeing the renovation of liberty
and justice resting on the British government, to vindicate the honour
of our common nature. These are concerns which do not perhaps belong
to any particular office: but, to speak more seriously to every man of
sentiment, actions like these are the just and sure foundation of
future fame; a reversion, though remote, is coveted by some noble
minds as a substantial good. It is upon these grounds that I hope and
expect the attention of gentlemen in power. These are designs
consonant to the elevation of their rank, and the dignity of their
stations: they are ends suitable to the nature of a free and generous
government; and, connected with views of empire and dominion, suited
to the benevolence and solid merit of the legislature. It is a pursuit
of substantial greatness.--May the time come--at least the speculation
to me is pleasing--when the sable people shall gratefully commemorate
the auspicious aera of extensive freedom. Then shall those persons[Z]
particularly be named with praise and honour, who generously proposed
and stood forth in the cause of humanity, liberty, and good policy;
and brought to the ear of the legislature designs worthy of royal
patronage and adoption. May Heaven make the British senators the
dispersers of light, liberty, and science, to the uttermost parts of
the earth: then will be glory to God on the highest, on earth peace,
and goodwill to men:--Glory, honour, peace, &c. to every soul of man
that worketh good, to the Britons first, (because to them the Gospel
is preached) and also to the nations. 'Those that honour their Maker
have mercy on the poor.' 'It is righteousness exalteth a nation; but
sin is a reproach to any people; destruction shall be to the workers
of iniquity, and the wicked shall fall by their own wickedness.' May
the blessings of the Lord be upon the heads of all those who
commiserated the cases of the oppressed negroes, and the fear of God
prolong their days; and may their expectations be filled with
gladness! 'The liberal devise liberal things, and by liberal things
shall stand,' Isaiah xxxii. 8. They can say with pious Job, 'Did not I
weep for him that was in trouble? was not my soul grieved for the
poor?' Job xxx. 25.

As the inhuman traffic of slavery is to be taken into the
consideration of the British legislature, I doubt not, if a system of
commerce was established in Africa, the demand for manufactures would
most rapidly augment, as the native inhabitants will insensibly adopt
the British fashions, manners, customs, &c. In proportion to the
civilization, so will be the consumption of British manufactures.

The wear and tear of a continent, nearly twice as large as Europe, and
rich in vegetable and mineral productions, is much easier conceived
than calculated.

A case in point.--It cost the Aborigines of Britain little or nothing
in clothing, &c. The difference between their forefathers and the
present generation, in point of consumption, is literally infinite.
The supposition is most obvious. It will be equally immense in
Africa--The same cause, viz. civilization, will ever have the same
effect.

It is trading upon safe grounds. A commercial intercourse with Africa
opens an inexhaustible source of wealth to the manufacturing interests
of Great Britain, and to all which the slave trade is an objection.

If I am not misinformed, the manufacturing interest is equal, if not
superior, to the landed interest, as to the value, for reasons which
will soon appear. The abolition of slavery, so diabolical, will give a
most rapid extension of manufactures, which is totally and
diametrically opposite to what some interested people assert.

The manufacturers of this country must and will, in the nature and
reason of things, have a full and constant employ by supplying the
African markets.

Population, the bowels and surface of Africa, abound in valuable and
useful returns; the hidden treasures of centuries will be brought to
light and into circulation. Industry, enterprize, and mining, will
have their full scope, proportionably as they civilize. In a word, it
lays open an endless field of commerce to the British manufactures and
merchant adventurer. The manufacturing interest and the general
interests are synonymous. The abolition of slavery would be in reality
an universal good.

Tortures, murder, and every other imaginable barbarity and iniquity,
are practised upon the poor slaves with impunity. I hope the slave
trade will be abolished. I pray it may be an event at hand. The great
body of manufacturers, uniting in the cause, will considerably
facilitate and expedite it; and, as I have already stated, it is most
substantially their interest and advantage, and as such the nation's
at large, (except those persons concerned in the manufacturing
neck-yokes, collars, chains, hand-cuffs, leg-bolts, drags,
thumb-screws, iron muzzles, and coffins; cats, scourges, and other
instruments of torture used in the slave trade). In a short time one
sentiment alone will prevail, from motives of interest as well as
justice and humanity. Europe contains one hundred and twenty millions
of inhabitants. Query--How many millions doth Africa contain?
Supposing the Africans, collectively and individually, to expend 5l. a
head in raiment and furniture yearly when civilized, &c. an immensity
beyond the reach of imagination!

This I conceive to be a theory founded upon facts, and therefore an
infallible one. If the blacks were permitted to remain in their own
country, they would double themselves every fifteen years. In
proportion to such increase will be the demand for manufactures.
Cotton and indigo grow spontaneously in most parts of Africa; a
consideration this of no small consequence to the manufacturing towns
of Great Britain. It opens a most immense, glorious, and happy
prospect--the clothing, &c. of a continent ten thousand miles in
circumference, and immensely rich in productions of every denomination
in return for manufactures.

I have only therefore to request the reader's indulgence and conclude.
I am far from the vanity of thinking there is any merit in this
narrative: I hope censure will be suspended, when it is considered
that it was written by one who was as unwilling as unable to adorn the
plainness of truth by the colouring of imagination. My life and
fortune have been extremely chequered, and my adventures various. Even
those I have related are considerably abridged. If any incident in
this little work should appear uninteresting and trifling to most
readers, I can only say, as my excuse for mentioning it, that almost
every event of my life made an impression on my mind and influenced my
conduct. I early accustomed myself to look for the hand of God in the
minutest occurrence, and to learn from it a lesson of morality and
religion; and in this light every circumstance I have related was to
me of importance. After all, what makes any event important, unless by
its observation we become better and wiser, and learn 'to do justly,
to love mercy, and to walk humbly before God?' To those who are
possessed of this spirit, there is scarcely any book or incident so
trifling that does not afford some profit, while to others the
experience of ages seems of no use; and even to pour out to them the
treasures of wisdom is throwing the jewels of instruction away.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote X: See the Public Advertiser, July 14, 1787.]

[Footnote Y: At the request of some of my most particular friends, I
take the liberty of inserting it here.]

[Footnote Z: Grenville Sharp, Esq; the Reverend Thomas Clarkson; the
Reverend James Ramsay; our approved friends, men of virtue, are an
honour to their country, ornamental to human nature, happy in
themselves, and benefactors to mankind!]


THE END.