As Fellow Christians, Obeying The Same
Legislator, They Love And Mutually Assist Each Other In All Their
Wants; As Fellow Labourers They Unite With Cordiality And Without
The Least Rancour In All Their Temporal Schemes:
No other emulation
appears among them but in their sea excursions, in the art of
fitting out their vessels; in that of sailing, in harpooning the
whale, and in bringing home the greatest harvest.
As fellow subjects
they cheerfully obey the same laws, and pay the same duties: but let
me not forget another peculiar characteristic of this community:
there is not a slave I believe on the whole island, at least among
the Friends; whilst slavery prevails all around them, this society
alone, lamenting that shocking insult offered to humanity, have
given the world a singular example of moderation, disinterestedness,
and Christian charity, in emancipating their negroes. I shall
explain to you farther, the singular virtue and merit to which it is
so justly entitled by having set before the rest of their fellow-
subjects, so pleasing, so edifying a reformation. Happy the people
who are subject to so mild a government; happy the government which
has to rule over such harmless, and such industrious subjects!
While we are clearing forests, making the face of nature smile,
draining marshes, cultivating wheat, and converting it into flour;
they yearly skim from the surface of the sea riches equally
necessary. Thus, had I leisure and abilities to lead you through
this continent, I could show you an astonishing prospect very little
known in Europe; one diffusive scene of happiness reaching from the
sea-shores to the last settlements on the borders of the wilderness:
an happiness, interrupted only by the folly of individuals, by our
spirit of litigiousness, and by those unforeseen calamities, from
which no human society can possibly be exempted.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 187 of 291
Words from 50794 to 51099
of 79752
