These publications
contained many new observations. They were written in a polished style; and
while they exhibited the erudition and talents, they showed the liberality
and benevolence, of the author. Having had a considerable circulation, they
spread conviction among many, and promoted the cause for which they had
been so laudibly undertaken. Of the great increase of friendly disposition
towards the African cause in this very year, we have this remarkable
proof;--that when the Quakers, living in East and West Jersey, wished to
petition the legislature to obtain an act of assembly for the more
equitable manumission of slaves in that province, so many others of
different persuasions joined them, that the petition was signed by upwards
of three thousand persons.
[Footnote A: Dr. Rush has been better known since for his other literary
works; such as his Medical Dissertations, his Treatises on the Discipline
of Schools, Criminal Law, &c.]
But in the next year, or in the year 1774[A], the increased good-will
towards the Africans became so apparent, but more particularly in
Pennsylvania, where the Quakers were more numerous than in any other state,
that they, who considered themselves more immediately as the friends of
these injured people, thought it right to avail themselves of it: and
accordingly James Pemberton, one of the most conspicuous of the Quakers in
Pennsylvania, and Dr.
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