The mournful procession was closed by some hundreds of those
poor Africans, who had been personally benefited by his labours, and whose
behaviour on the occasion showed the gratitude and affection they
considered to be due to him as their own private benefactor, as well as the
benefactor of their whole race.
Such, then, were the labours of the Quakers, in America, of individuals,
from 1718 to 1784, and of the body at large, from 1696 to 1787, in this
great cause of humanity and religion. Nor were the effects produced from
these otherwise than corresponding with what might have been expected from
such an union of exertion in such a cause; for both the evils, that is, the
evil of buying and selling, and the evil of using, slaves, ceased at length
with the members of this benevolent Society. The leaving off all concern
with the Slave-trade took place first. The abolition of slavery, though it
followed, was not so speedily accomplished; for, besides the loss of
property, when slaves were manumitted without any pecuniary consideration
in return, their owners had to struggle, in making them free, against the
laws and customs of the times.
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