JB/008/108/001

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1821 July 24 Omitted.
Rid Yourselves

Lett. 19 Relinquishment Honorable
No Slave Trade

1.
Mentioned above, jargon
employed for defence of
oppression and depredation:
for want of any thing
better
– viz: splendour, honour,
glory &c.
For defence of Slave
trade, jargon in this form
is inapplicable. In seizing,
and treating worse
than cattle, unoffending
men, no honour, glory,
dignity: no antique habit
of sovereignty, &c.

2.
Jargon word here necessity:
fact true, argument cogent:
necessary the continuance
of this trade to cultivation,
to extension of population.

3.
Necessary? Yes. But to
what things? to gain by
oppression, murder, injustice
in its most flagitious
forms: to what persons?
those who, in pursuit
of that profit, are ardent
in the practice of
this injustice.

4.
So much for necessity. By any other word or
words, though repeated
like aves and pater nosters,
could the selfish barbarity
be any more alleviated?

5.
Good on this scale, try the
argument on any less extensive
do. – housebreaking,
robbing, coupled or not with
murder, according as, by
obstinacy or audacity, the
sufferer had or had not
made it necessary.
Robbing men of that liberty
in which is included
all their property, and
incidentally

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Lett. 19 Relinquishmt Honorable
No Slave Trade

5 Contind.
incidentally life, is necessary
to the slave dealer's
living in the stile he would
wish: as robbing traveller
of his money is necessary
to highwayman's
living in stile he would
wish.

6.
To the slave dealer, aiding,
abetting, supporting,
engaging blacks in that
course of murder, which,
on a scale of a certain
magnitude, is glory &c.,
is to Slave dealer necessary:
so of each gang bought –
murdering a proportion,
by weeks or months torment,
is necessary to good
economy: so to robber,
murdering traveller, if
obstine or resisting.

If by his necessity slave
dealer is justified, – in
comparison of him and
his accomplices of all
sorts, and every where,
highwayman, even cut
throat do., is a saint.

8.
He who tells me that,
to him or to those with
whom he is united in interest
or affection, this
practice is necessary –
what hinders him from
robbing and murdering
me? fear of punishment
or of that disrepute which
attach not in equal degrees
upon Slave traders
– robbery and murder,
custom being a cloak for
it.

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Lett. 19 Relinquishmt Honorable
No Slave Trade

9.
Tyranny – abhorring
it when exercised over
you, do you cling to it
when exercised by you
or, as you think, for
your profit?

10
Continuing to protect
this trade, what are you
as to religion? If insincere,
what is your religion
in your eyes? a religion
which seeks not to restrain
men from the
most flagitious enormities?
– Robbery and murder,
and upon so wide
a scale. By any number
of masses can they be
atoned for? With reference
to the present life (setting
aside the future) would
such a religion not be a
nuisance? the maintenance prevalence
of it a calamity –
maintenance, a grievance?

11.
More inexcusable wd.
you be than the Colonist
in giving support to this
trade: in both, it is injustice,
inhumanity, maleficence: but, in those
to whom it may be profitable,
it may be prudence – self-regarding
prudence: in
you, to whom it can not
be even supposed to bring
profit, it is moreover
imprudence.

Identifier: | JB/008/108/001 "JB/" can not be assigned to a declared number type with value 8.
Date_1	1821-07-24	Marginal Summary Numbering	1-11
Box	008	Main Headings	rid yourselves of ultramaria
Folio number	108	Info in main headings field	rid yourselves
Image	001	Titles	lett. 19 relinquishmt honorable / no slave trade
Category	marginal summary sheet	Number of Pages	1
Recto/Verso	recto	Page Numbering	e1
Penner	john flowerdew colls	Watermarks	j whatman 1819
Marginals		Paper Producer	jonathan blenman
Corrections	jeremy bentham	Paper Produced in Year	1819
Notes public	[[notes_public::"omitted" [note in bentham's hand]]]	ID Number	3212
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