CHAPTER XIII.

A. 1700-proposes and carries in his own monthly meeting Resolutions relative to Indians and Negro slavesremoves obstructions and nuisances in the city-calls the Assembly proceedings of the same-visits and receives Indians-travels in the ministry through the Province and Territories, and in the Jerseys and Maryland-anecdotes of him while on this excursion-calls a new Assembly at Newcastle-substance of his speech to them-proceedings of the same-their dissentionsthese allayed by his wisdom and justice-particulars relative to their rules and customs.

WILLIAM PENN, having passed his Bills against piracy and illicit trade, retired to his mansion at Pennsbury, which was then as well as afterwards the place of his general residence. There were two objects which at this time particularly occupied his attention there. He had already interested himself in one of them during his first residence in America, namely, the instruction and civilization of the Indians. He was

now desirous of resuming it, and also of taking into consideration the other, which related to the condition of African or Negro slaves.

I must observe on the latter subject, that soon after the colony had been planted, that

is, in the year 1682, when William Penn was first resident in it, some few Africans had been imported, but that more had followed. At this time the traffic in slaves was not branded with infamy as at the present day. It was considered, on the other hand, as favourable to both parties: to the American planters, because they had but few labourers in comparison with the extent of their lands; and to the poor Africans themselves, because they were looked upon as persons redeemed out of superstition, idolatry, and heathenism. But though the purchase and sale of them had been admitted with less caution upon this principle, there were not wanting among the Quakers of Pennsylvania those who, soon after the introduction of them there, began to question the moral licitness of the traffic. Accordingly, at the yearly meeting for Pennsylvania, held in 1688, it had been resolved, on the suggestion of emigrants from Crisheim who had adopted the principles of William Penn, that the buying, selling, and holding men in slavery was inconsistent with the tenets of the Christian religion. In 1696 a similar Resolution had been passed at the yearly meeting of the same religious Society

for

for the same province. In consequence then of these noble Resolutions, the Quakers had begun to treat their slaves in a manner different from that of other people. They had begun to consider them as the children of the same great Parent, to whom fraternal offices were due; and hence, in 1698, there were instances where they had admitted them into their meeting-houses to *worship in common with themselves.

William

* I cannot help copying into a note an anecdote from Thomas Story's Journal for this year. "On the thirteenth," says he, "we had a pretty large meeting, where several were tendered, among which were some Negroes. And here I shall observe, that Thomas Simons having several Negroes, one of them, as also several belonging to Henry White, had of late come to meetings, and, having a sense of Truth, several others thereaway were likewise convinced, and like to do well. And the morning that we came from Thomas Simons's, my companion speaking some words of Truth to his Negro-woman, she was tendered, and as I passed on horseback by the place where she stood weeping, I gave her my hand, and then she was much more broken; and finding the day of the Lord's tender visitation and mercy upon her, I spake encouragingly to her, and was glad to find the poor Blacks so near the Truth and reachable. She stood there looking after us, and weeping, as long as we could see her. I had inquired of one of the Black men, how long they had come to meetings; and he said, they had al

ways

William Penn was highly gratified by the consideration of what had been done on this important subject. From the very first introduction of enslaved Africans into his province he had been solicitous about their temporal and eternal welfare. He had always considered them as persons of the like nature with himself, as having the same desire of pleasure and the same aversion from pain, as children of the same Father, and heirs of the same promises. Knowing how naturally the human heart became corrupted and hardened by the use of power, he was fearful lest in time these friendless strangers should become an oppressed people. Accordingly, as his predecessor George Fox, when he first visited the British West India

ways been kept in ignorance, and disregarded as persons who were not to expect any thing from the Lord, till Jonathan Taylor, who had been there the year before, discoursing with them, had informed them that the grace of God through Christ was given also to them; and that they ought to believe in and be led and taught by it, and so might come to be good Friends, and saved as well as others. And on the next occasion, which was when William Ellis and Aaron Atkinson were there, they went to meetings, and several of them were convinced.' Thus one planteth, and another watereth, but God giveth the increase,"

islands,

islands, exhorted all those, who attended his meetings for worship there to consider their slaves as branches of their own families, for whose spiritual instruction they would one day or other be required to give an account, so William Penn had, on his first arrival in America, inculcated the same notion. It lay therefore now upon his mind to endeavour to bring into practice what had appeared to him to be right in principle. To accomplish this, there were two ways. One of them was, to try to incorporate the treatment of slaves as a matter of Christian duty, into the discipline of his own religious Society; and the other, to secure it among others in the colony of a different religious description, by a legislative act. Both of these were necessary. The former, however, he resolved to attempt first. The Society itself had already afforded him a precedent by its Resolutions in 1688 and in 1696, as before mentioned, and had thereby done something material in the progress of the work. It was only to get a minute passed upon their books to the intended effect. Accordingly, at the very first monthly meeting of the Society, which took place in Philadelphia in

the