lash against nature and religion, and will surely stand recorded against you, since they are all, with respect to your _impious_ selves, in a state of nature; in a state of original dissociation; perfectly free. * * * * * FOOTNOTES [Footnote 109: See Part II Chapter I second paragraph.] [Footnote 110: See Part II Chapter IX last paragraph.] * * * * * CHAP. XI. Having now considered both the _commerce_ and _slavery_, it remains only to collect such arguments as are scattered in different parts of the work, and to make such additional remarks, as present themselves on the subject. And first, let us ask you, who have studied the law of nature, and you, who are learned in the law of the land, if all property must not be inferiour in its nature to its possessor, or, in other words, (for it is a case, which every person must bring home to his own breast) if you suppose that any human being can have _a property in yourselves_? Let us ask you appraisers, who scientifically know the value of things, if any human creature is equivalent only to any of the trinkets that you wear, or at most, to any of the horses that you ride: or in other words, if you have ever considered the most costly things that you have valued, as _equivalent to yourselves?_ Let us ask you rationalists, if man, as a reasonable being, is not _accountable_ for his actions, and let us put the same question to you, who have studied the divine writings? Let us ask you parents, if ever you thought that you possessed an _authority_ as such, or if ever you expected a _duty_ from your sons; and let us ask you sons, if ever you felt an impulse in your own breasts to _obey_ your parents. Now, if you should all answer as we could wish, if you should all answer consistently with reason, nature, and the revealed voice of God, what a dreadful argument will present itself against the commerce and slavery of the human species, when we reflect, that no man whatever can be bought or reduced to the situation of a slave, _but he must instantly become a brute, he must instantly be reduced to the value of those things, which were made for his own use and convenience; he must instantly cease to be accountable for his actions, and his authority as a parent, and his duty as a son, must be instantly no more_. Neither does it escape our notice, when we are speaking of the fatal wound which every social duty must receive, how considerably Christianity suffers by the conduct of you _receivers_. For by prosecuting this impious commerce, you keep the _Africans_ in a state of perpetual ferocity and barbarism; and by prosecuting it in such a manner, as must represent your religion, as a system of robbery and oppression, you not only oppose the propagation of the gospel, as far as you are able yourselves, but throw the most certain impediments in the way of others, who might attempt the glorious and important task.