The Natural Love
Of Offspring, Shared With The Human Race By The Most Savage Beast,
Ceases To Warm The Heart Of The Wretched Slave.
Why should the mother
love her child, if it is born to become the PROPERTY of her owner?
- To
be SOLD as soon as it can exist without the mother's care. Why should
the girl be modest, when she knows that she is the actual PROPERTY, the
slave, of every purchaser? Slavery murders the sacred feeling of love,
that blessing that cheers the lot of the poorest man, that spell that
binds him to his wife, and child, and home. Love cannot exist with
slavery - the mind becomes brutalized to an extent that freezes all those
tender feelings that Nature has implanted in the human heart to separate
it from the beast; and the mind, despoiled of all noble instincts,
descends to hopeless brutality. Thus is Africa accursed: nor can she be
raised to any scale approaching to civilization until the slave-trade
shall be totally suppressed. The first step necessary to the improvement
of the savage tribes of the White Nile is the annihilation of the
slave-trade. Until this be effected, no legitimate commerce can be
established; neither is there an opening for missionary enterprise - the
country is sealed and closed against all improvement.
Nothing would be easier than to suppress this infamous traffic, were the
European Powers in earnest. Egypt is in favour of slavery. I have never
seen a Government official who did not in argument uphold slavery as an
institution absolutely necessary to Egypt, thus any demonstration made
against the slave-trade by the Government of that country will be simply
a pro forma movement to blind the European Powers.
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