When, passing along, I have
viewed your plantations cleared and cultivated, many spacious
houses built and the owners of them faring sumptuously every
day, my blood has frequently almost run cold within me, to
consider how many of your slaves had neither convenient food to
eat, nor proper raiment to put on, notwithstanding most of the
comforts you enjoy were solely owing to their indefatigable
labours.
The letter, from which this is an extract, produced a desirable effect
upon many of those who perused it, but particularly upon such as began
to be seriously disposed in these times. And as George Whitfield
continued a firm friend to the poor Africans, never losing an
opportunity of serving them, he interested, in the course of his useful
life, many thousands of his followers in their favour.
To this account it may be added, that from the year 1762 ministers, who
were in the connection of John Wesley, began to be settled in America,
and that as these were friends to the oppressed Africans also, so they
contributed in their turn[A] to promote a softness of feeling towards
them among those of their own persuasion.
[Footnote A: It must not be forgotten, that the example of the Moravians
had its influence also in directing men to their duty towards these
oppressed people; for though, when they visited this part of the world
for their conversion, they never meddled with the political state of
things, by recommending it to masters to alter the condition of their
slaves, as believing religion could give comfort in the most abject
situations in life, yet they uniformly freed those slaves who came into
their own possession.
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