Walker's Appeal, with a Brief Sketch of His Life: And Also Garnet's Address to the Slaves of the United States of AmericaWalker, David
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Walker's Appeal, with a Brief Sketch of His Life: And Also Garnet's Address to the Slaves of the United States of America
Walker, David
Slavery -- United States
Have you not, on the contrary, entered among us, and learnt us the art
of throat-cutting, by setting us to fight, one against another, to
take each other as prisoners of war, and sell to you for small bits of
calicoes, old swords, knives, &c. to make slaves for you and your
children? This being done, have you not brought us among you, in
chains and handcuffs, like brutes, and treated us with all the
cruelties and rigour your ingenuity could invent, consistent with the
laws of your country, which (for the blacks) are tyrannical enough?
Can the American preachers appeal unto God, the Maker and Searcher of
hearts, and tell him, with the Bible in their hands, that they make no
distinction on account of men's colour? Can they say, O God! thou
knowest all things--thou knowest that we make no distinction between
thy creatures to whom we have to preach thy Word? Let them answer the
Lord; and if they cannot do it in the affirmative, have they not
departed from the Lord Jesus Christ, their master? But some may say,
that they never had or were in possession of a religion, which makes
no distinction, and of course they could not have departed from it. I
ask you then, in the name of the Lord, of what kind can your religion
be? Can it be that which was preached by our Lord Jesus Christ from
Heaven? I believe you cannot be so wicked as to tell him that his
Gospel was that of _distinction_. What can the American preachers and
people take God to be?--Do they believe his words? If they do, do they
believe that he will be mocked? Or do they believe because they are
whites and we blacks, that God will have respect to them? Did not God
make us as it seemed best to himself? What right, then, has one of us,
to despise another and to treat him cruel, on account of his colour,
which none but the God who made it can alter? Can there be a greater
absurdity in nature, and particularly in a free republican country?
But the Americans, having introduced slavery among them, their hearts
have become almost seared, as with an hot iron, and God has nearly
given them up to believe a lie in preference to the truth!!! and I am
awfully afraid that pride, prejudice, avarice and blood, will, before
long, prove the final ruin of this happy republic, or land of
liberty!!! Can any thing be a greater mockery of religion than the way
in which it is conducted by the Americans? It appears as though they
are bent only on daring God Almighty to do his best--they chain and
handcuff us and our children and drive us around the country like
brutes, and go into the house of the God of justice to return Him
thanks for having aided him in their infernal cruelties inflicted upon
us. Will the Lord suffer this people to go on much longer, taking his
holy name in vain? Will he not stop them, PREACHERS and all? O
Americans! Americans!! I call God--I call angels--I call men, to
witness, that your DESTRUCTION _is at hand_, and will be speedily
consummated unless you REPENT.
FOOTNOTES:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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