It has been considered, and repeatedly declared by His Majesty’s ministers, that a progressive amelioration in the condition of the slaves, the diffusion of moral instruction, the just appreciation of the blessings of a pure religion, and a gradual reformation in manners and opinions, should continue to exercise their salutary influence, until slavery insensibly glided into freedom. Yet compulsory manumission proceeds in express contradiction to this principle. It teaches the slave, that the sooner he demands his freedom the easier it will be for him to succeed. It discourages the idea of delaying till the morals be improved by instruction, and it urges him to rush forward at once by the most expeditious course, by teaching him, that those only who delay incur the danger of disappointment. The public at large have been harangued about the _gradual operation_ of the measure. What will be their surprise when they understand, that the meaning of such gradual operation simply is, that the difficulties in attaining the object sought should become greater by degrees instead of less? It is, indeed, a notable specimen of legislation, to announce to the slaves,—Now that you are ignorant, you may procure your freedom for 100_l._; but some years hence, when you have improved by instruction, you will have to pay five times as much. Under such excitements, a measure which works on the predominant passions of men, awakening in them mutual feelings of envy and distrust, prompting each to take advantage of his fellow, and universally forestalling the fruits of civilisation, must be utterly incompatible with the well-being of the slave. Who, therefore, can maintain, all the circumstances enumerated in the foregoing sections taken in conjunction, that compulsory manumission is in conformity with the Resolution of Parliament? CHAPTER V. SAFETY OF THE COLONIES ENDANGERED. The correspondence of Mr. Canning with Mr. Galatin, lately published, evinces plainly the importance which is attached to our transatlantic possessions. It cannot be supposed that a minister of state will hold one tone to a foreign power, and a different one to ourselves. It is on occasions of public diplomacy, when our own policy is opposed to that of the great rising republic of America, that the full swell of public opinion makes known the extent of interest felt by the British nation towards her colonies. The love of dominion is natural to mankind, and few like to lose what they have once possessed; but, with the reflecting part of the nation, this feeling is strengthened by the consciousness that slavery itself will be promoted by the destruction of the British colonies. Foreign nations will take up what we abandon; and if we are still to consume sugar, the state of the continental markets proves to a demonstration that that consumption will be supplied by slave-labour, and not by free labour from either east or west.