Now he begged to remark that the paper from which he had read the
foregoing extract, the New-York Observer, together with the one from
which it was originally taken, the Boston Recorder, printed more
matter weekly than all the avowed abolition newspapers, in America,
put together, did in half a year. He would notice farther, in relation
to the great display of abolition publications which had been made by
Mr. Thompson on the platform, that one of the papers lying there on
the table, had advocated his principles and cause when he was in
Boston, and likely to be mobbed at the instigation, as he believed,
of Mr. Garrison. Some of the remainder of the publications were, he
believed, long ago dead; some could hardly be said ever to have
lived; some were purely occasional; the greater part as limited in
circulation as they were contemptible in point of merit. Not above
two or three of the dozen or fifteen that had been produced before
them--and the names of which he (Mr. B.) required to be recorded--were
in fact, worthy to be called respectable and avowed abolition
newspapers. But to come to the point immediately in hand. He would
on the present occasion attempt to show that abolition was not worthy
to supplant the colonization scheme in the affections of Americans
or Britons, or of any other thinking people. He acknowledged that
there were many respectable men in the ranks of the abolitionists;
but these, almost without exception, had been at one time
colonizationists; and had he time he might show that many of them
had deserted the colonization society on some peculiar or personal
grounds, not involving the principles of the cause. He was prepared
to show, however, that by whomsoever supported, the principles of the
abolitionists were essentially wrong, and that their practice was
still worse. He had not access to the voluminous documents brought
forward by Mr. Thompson. Mr. Thompson had, indeed, that evening, on
this platform, publicly offered him access to them. Had that offer
been made at the beginning of the discussion, instead of the end of
it, or during the four or five days we spent in Glasgow before it
commenced, it might have been turned to some advantage. But as it
was, the audience would know how to appreciate it; and he must rely
solely upon memory, when he stated the principles promulgated by
abolitionists; though at the same time he pledged himself that his
statements not only were intended to be, but were, substantially
correct and entirely candid. The abolitionists held, then, in the
first place, as a fundamental truth, that every human being had an
instant right to be free, irrespective of consequences to himself and
others; consequently that it was the duty of masters to set free their
slaves instantly, and irrespective of all consequences; and of course,
sinful to exercise the powers of a master for one moment, or for any
purpose. This was, in substance, the great principle on which the
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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