That parts us, are emancipate and loose. (Immense cheering.) After a brief history of the struggles which led to the abolition of the slave trade in 1807, and an eulogium on Wesley, Clarkson, Wilberforce, Fox, Burke Sheridan, and other philanthropists who took part in those struggles, Mr. Thompson said that they were now met together to say whether something more did not remain to be done before England could be thoroughly purged from the guilt of slavery, and whether that something more was not the entire annihilation of slavery in the colonies. They were assembled to discuss the evils of slavery, and he begged the particular attention of those who were to reply to him, whilst he endeavored to show that slavery was contrary to the principles of humanity, the precepts of reason, and the dictates of a sound and just policy. One of the evils of slavery which met him on the threshold, was, that it invariably cursed the soil on which it existed, with sterility;he need not, he was sure, tell the inhabitants of Liverpool that the incessant reaping of ripe crops from the same soil must necessarily produce that sterility. Another of its evils was, that it had been the origin of the slave trade in all ages of the world. Another evil was, that it doomed an infant, even before it came into the world, to interminable slavery. They were told that the only reason for withholding freedom from the negro was, that he was not yet fit to receive the blessing; but how did this apply to the unborn child? Could he not be trained for liberty? (Loud applause.) Pharaoh pleaded the same excuse for detaining the Israelites till the judgments of God compelled him to release them; and Pharaoh's reason was of the same nature as that of modern slave owners, he wanted more bricks, and they wanted more sugar. (Laughter and applause.) He asked liberty for every infant born in the British colonies. Tell him not of the alleged inhumanity of negro mothers-tell him not that planters and drivers were the best nurses for children. Did not the raven, the tigress-did every brute beast provide for their young; and could it be said that the negro mother would not provide for hers? (Applause.) Did the planters know how much responsibility they were creating for themselves in taking possession of an immortal soul? At the last awful day would they be able to answer the question why they had enslaved their fellow-man? What might that child have become had he not been doomed from the womb to till the ground as a slave, under the infliction of 'Stripes that Mercy, with a bleeding heart, Another evil of slavery is, that it depresses the body by excessive labor, while it takes from the slave all the ordinary motives of exertion. Mr. Thompson here gave a very beautiful exposition of the motives and incentives which induce the English laborer to pursue his toils with cheerfulness and contentment. The statesman, the soldier, the sailor, and every class of persons who engage in laborious pursuits, either mental or bodily, are actuated by similar motives. But why toils the negro? Toils he for a wife? He may say with Othello, Alas! I have no wife! While engaged in his task he might hear the shrieks of his wife in some adjoining field, laid down by the command of some cruel overseer, and writhing beneath the murderous lash. She is not his wife, for she is the property of another. Toils he for children? Toils he for liberty-for himself, or that he may transmit the boon of freedom to his posterity? Toils he for remuneration, for fame, for promotion, or any of the other rewards of labor? No. Then why does he toil? The whip is behind him! Fear is the only impulse which urges him to continue his degrading and laborious task. Slavery entailed on the slave all imaginable suffering. There was no species of misery, or wretchedness, or oppression to which he was not exposed and subjected. If this were denied, he would load the table, and overwhelm his opponents with evidence of the fact. They might, perhaps, be told, as he had been, that the slave had four parlors and a saloon in the middle! (Laughter.) He could prove that the privations and sufferings of the slave were extreme, even in the best regulated colonies, and under the most humane masters. Among the evils of slavery were poverty, nakedness, starvation, imprisonment. If this were denied, he could refer to a Parliamentary report which he had in his hand, and which it was declared by the West Indians themselves, that they had not a sufficiency of food for their slaves. Such therefore was the 'economical' oppression of the system, as it had been appropriately termed, that the slaves even of the best masters were exposed to poverty and starvation. As for imprisonment, the bailiff, with his marshal and his dogs, might come in the middle of the night, seize the slave in his cabin, and sell him by auction next morning to the highest bidder, for the payment of his master's debts. To this the slaves of the kindest master were liable; even the master, by unusual kindness to his slaves, might bring himself to premature ruin. It was said that there was slavery here. But he would affirm that there was no slavery in Britain at all approximating to the West Indian slavery. Could they produce a man or woman, the poorest and most wretched in the land, whose names were engrossed on parchment and mortgaged to a money lender? Could a man be seized during the night by a civil officer, and sold by auction for his master's debts?. Or could they find in the country a man so poor or so miserable that he would exchange his condition for that of the negro? (Cries of "Not one -' thousands '—' not one.') Another evil of slavery, and he begged that it might be noticed in the reply, was the fearful decrease in the slave population. In our sugar colonies, with one exception, the slave population were dying off so fast, that in something better than half a century they would be extinct. Mr. Thompson here broke into an eloquent denunciation of those who wished to delay the emancipation of the slaves-who would coolly wait until slavery and death had done their work, till desolation had overspread the colonies, and the slaves had become (74) MR. THOMPSON'S LECTURE. Report of the Proceedings at the meetings of Messrs. Thompson and Borthwick held at the Royal Amphitheatre, Liverpool, on the Evenings of August 28, 29, 30, 31, and September 6, 1832.-From a Supplement of the Liverpool Times. It was announced last week, that MR. GEORGE THOMPSON, one of the advocates of the Anti-Slavery Societies, who has been lecturing in London, Manchester, and several other places, on the evils of slavery, would deliver a lecture on the same subject, at the Royal Amphitheatre, in this town, a place admirably suited, by its extent and accommodations, for the thousands who might naturally be expected to assemble together on a question of such vital interest and importance. We seldom remember to have seen so much interest excited on any subject, as has been exhibited by our townsmen within the last few days. As it was deemed desirable that both sides of the question should be laid before the public, after some negotiation between the West India body and the committee of the Anti-Slavery Society, it was arranged that Mr. Thompson should lecture on Tuesday evening; that Mr. Borthwick should speak on Wednesday, on the opposite side; that Mr. Thompson should be heard in reply on Thursday,and that the admission on all the three nights should be by tickets, equally distributed by both parties, in order to secure a select assemblage, and prevent, as far as possible, the recurrence of those scenes of clamor and tumult which have taken place elsewhere. Upwards of 8,000 tickets were so distributed, and even then, almost up to the time of the meeting the greatest anxiety was exhibited to procure them, and hundreds of persons who applied were obliged to go away disappointed. At half past six on Tuesday night, the hour fixed for the commencement of the proceeding, the Amphitheatre was crowded in every part, from the pit to the gallery, with a numerous and most respectable assemblage, the speaker, and several gentlemen of both committees, taking their station on the stage, where ample accommodations was provided for them, and for the gentlemen connected with the press. With these few introductory remarks, we shall proceed to our summary report of the discussion. MR. ADAM HODGSON, in taking the chair, said he felt himself called to a situation of great delicacy and difficulty, being, on the one hand, a member of the Liverpool Anti-Slavery Society, and on the other, and in some degree, the representative of the West Indian body,-bound to secure a fair and impartial hearing for both parties, without any reference to his own individual feelings and sentiments, which had been long before the public, and which nothing could induce him to abandon. He should endeavor to perform the duties of his station with firmness and impartiality, trusting to the support of the meeting; and he hoped that both parties would behave with the utmost order and decorum, abstaining from all manifestations of applause and disapprobation, and remembering that no cause whatever could be served by clamor, but might be materially injured by it. (Hear, hear.) After some further observations to the same effect, Mr. Hodgson concluded by saying that Mr. Borthwick would reply to Mr. Thompson, from the same place, on the following night, and by requesting for that gentleman the same patient and attentive hearing as that which he solicited for Mr. Thompson. MR. G. THOMPSON then came forward, and said that, after an absence of twenty years from his native town, he trusted that he would not be deemed altogether a stranger where he appeared as an advocate of the great cause he was called upon to plead, and that, as an Englishman and fellow-townsman, he would not be denied a calm, patient, and attentive hearing. He did not come to discuss the wonders of the heavens or the beauties of the earth, or to lecture upon any subject of science, nature or art, such as those to which other lecturers had called their attention; it was his painful and responsible duty to lay before them a |