The British Press; or, Morning Literary Advertiser.
London, England, 1824-02-24 00:00:00

FASHIONABLE INTELLIGENCE.

The Duchess of Somerset has issued cards of invitation for her I
first rout on the Ist March, at her house in Park lane.
Mrs. Sotheby will give a rout this evening, at her house in Lower
Orosvenur-street.

dlr. Secretary Canning entertained Viscount and Viscountess
Granville and a distinguished party at dinner yesterday at Glou-
cester Lodge.
General Rosa will have a grand dinner party on Saturday next,
at his house in Portland-place.
Lord Gifford had a grand dinner party yesterday, at his house,
Whitehall -place.
Mrs. Benyon had a select circle of fashionable yesterday, at her
house in Grosvenor-square.
C. it. Ellis, Esq. 31. P. had a dinner party yesterday, at his
house in Audley-square.
The Countess of Bristol arrived yesterday evening at her house
in St. James's-square, from Brighton.
The Earl and Countess of Jersey and family have arrived at
their house in Berkeley-squarty from their seat, Middleton Park,
Oxfordshire.

The Earl of Ileshomugh has left town for Brighton.
Granville Penn. Eaq. and family have arrived at their house in
Hertford street. May-fair, from Brighton.
Sir Robert and lA*l, Buxton and family have arrived at their
house in Harley street. their seat, Shadwell Lodge, Norfolk.
Departures from the British Hotel, Jermyn.street :—Mr. ('oke
and family for their seat in Derbyshire; G. Illacartney, Esq.,
on a tour; G. Greenland, Esq.. for Brighton.
Departures from Kirkham's lintel, Lower Brook-street :—Lord
Thotras Cecil, for Butleigb, Lincolnshire; Lord and Lady Man_
di rine, on a tour; Lady Caroline 31ontagu, ditto; Mr. Edge'',
ditto; General Walpole. from ditto in Larlingford.
Arrivals at the Royalllotel. St. James's :—Sir Thomas Ormhy,
Bart., from Colchester; J. Sparkts, Esq.,; G. T. Smith, Esq.
from a tour. Departures from ditto :—Tbe Rev. .1. Billington,
on a tour; Colonel Scott, foe Staines ; W. Barren, Esq., and
Page, Esq., on a tour.
Viscount and Viscountess Granville and suite will leave town this
day for Holland.

TO THE EDITOR OF TIE BRITISH PRESS.

St a,—A correspondent your Paper of Wednesday last,
who signs himself " Lie car As," aware, I suppose of the
, weakness of his cause, makes up for the want of it by corn-
! bining his forms with those of Mr. Stephen, whose recent
volume on West India Storer!) he quotes at great length
and with great applause. Mr. Stephen, Sir, is welcome to
all the aid which lie can give to his cause from such an
auxiliary. But while this corespondent bespeaks your
• candour, and entreats that you would divest your mind of
all prejudice on this great question, he would do well to
give a better example of candour and freedom from preju-
dice himself. What is it to the question of emancipation
that Mr. Ilibbert is furnished with tLe means of making
such communications as may be necessary through the
medium of the public ? Ido not know that the fact
is so, and therefore!' neither admit nor deny it; but I ask,
what has it to do with the question at issue—which is,
whether the emancipation of the negroes of the West Indies
is a wise and politic, or even a humane and necessary mea-
sure at this time, and in the present state of West India
property? As to the cruelties said to be practised towards
the slaves in our colonies, we have ample proof that the
statements on this head are greatly exaggerated, and the
greater part of them pure invention. There are many in-
stances on record in which the slaves, so far from taking
advantage of any chance Of successful insurrection, have
even exposed their lives in defence of their masters : no
very strong proof this of their being in that state of bond-
age and degradation which the modern philanthropists are
so fend of describing. LIDERTAS denies that the Weft
India proprietors would be entitled to compensation in the
event of their losing their mums, through the experimental
beneficence of those professors of humanity who ate gradu-
ated in the school of Mr. Wilberforce. But, Sir, if, upon
the faith of Parliament, a great body of men have em-
barked their capital in any trade, be it what it may—surely
if Parliament, from motives of policy, or from any other
motives, refuse any longer to recognize the principles upon
which such trade is conducted, but which thee were the
first to sanction, is it common justice that the persons
whose property is thus inverted arc to be ruined by this
change of opinion in the Legislature, and to suffer without
indemnity? Mr. Stephen has credit with. LIIICPITAS for
being an able man, and a man of ardent piety. - This sort
of reputation is easily given, and perhaps is easily gained.
But, Sir, an 'evangelical exterior may be very consistent
with a full flow of gall and bitterness within: the tree is
bast known by its fruits. Let me refer your correspondent
to a pamphlet just published, Oa the Intpaliry and Injus-
tice of Emancipating the 2V grit Slaves. lie will there find
milicient proof that, if anyone wished to compile a manual
of the vulgar.tongue, the speeches alitpampldets of Mr.
Wilberforcei and of his.eative, Mr. Stephen, would of
themselves furnish an amp fund of materials. Both these
serious Christians, who deprecate all abuse and slander in
others, do not fail to deal pretty largely in this way them-
selves.

" Can be hare forgotten"—says the writer of the
pamphlet I allude to, speaking of Mr. Wilberforce—" Can
he have forgotten his own and Mr. Stephen's reproaches
against the—' hypocrisy of the iniquitous laws'—' the little
juntas of slave-masters'—' the white mob'—' the West
Indian aristocracy'—' the petty contumacious law-givers'—
and in this his own last work—' the white oppressors, and
the white savages,' &c. of the Colonies ?" (p. 4.)
" These fair set terms," says the same writer in a few
rlif.further on, " remind us of sonic of the writings of
es
Stephen, equally calculate(' to establish his claim also
to self-devotion in the cause of philanthropy. The most
remarkable of these is a speech, which he delivered in
1817, at the annual meeting of the African institution, at
the Freemasons' Tavern, and afterwards publi4ied for the
edification of those, who might not have been fortunate
enough to bear this noblest declamation of so illustrious a
teacher of morality. Not the tenth part of the epithets
applied to the Colonial Legislatures in this production
could have been tolerated in private society; but we pre-
sume the atmosphere in which philanthropy breathes is an
attenuating medium, and has the property of imparting'
a sublimated quality to that which, in ordinary cases,
Ravitins in crassojurares acre natum.
Whatever, therefore, under these exhilarating influences,
proceeds from Mr. Stephen, as an African Director, may
re considered the standard of Attic refinement and pro-
priety : for instance, it is very elegant and consistent too,
at least with his other writinea. to accuse those—' who I
have the misfortune'—as Mr. Wilberforce says, to be con-
nected with the colonial system, of—' malice, venom*—
notorious jacobinism, inhuman spirit of legislation'—' of
acts which it is impossible for an Englishman to read with-
out a blush of shame and indignation'—' monstrous con-
clusions'—' slanderous inferences'—' distortion of facts'—
' licentiousness of assertion'—' false statements'—' insa-
tiable appetite for defamation'—' false pretences'—' arrant
trifling'—' strange calumnious tales'—' audacity'—' effron-
tery'—' rancorous hostility and hatred'—' base fanaticism,
fell enthusiasm,' /U.* All this is no doubt very elegant, con-
sistent, and to on ;-1-very becoming in a Master in Chancery
to step from his official scat, to throw off his judicial gravity
and temper, mount the rostrum at a tavern, and, in the
true spirit of—' candor and tenderxesi—thus to designate
a numerous, most important, and powerful clan of his
fellow-subjects. Very philanthropic all this! and no
doubt equally in good taste to address it to the cars of his
Royal highness the Duke of Gloucester, who is President
of this notable Society, and to whose family the Colonists
have ever testified the most tn:sliaken and loyal attach-
ment."

After witnessing all this distribution of vulgar invective
which these gentle:neu scatter about them so profusely,
" LIDERTAS" will, I hope, in future be silent as to the
Christian mildness of these leaders of the present religious
crusade against the West Indian planters. It has been
well urged against the philanthropic Mr. Buxton, that
careless as be is of putting the property of the Colonists to
the risk of utter ruin by his speculative benevolence on be-
half of his fellow-creatures, yet no one more strenuously
resisted the regulative ii:terference of Parliament with the
price of porter, and of the vested capital of the brewers. Ile
could not be made to yield, for an instant, to the right of
the lower classes to be supplied with a wholesome beverage
at s fair pric?; that is, at a price not fixed by combination
and fortified by monopoly! Let these mighty, zealous
abolitionists learn to be a little more consistent. In their
zeal and assiduity they are, I grant, indefatigable. I only
wish their love of justice was as visible as the one, and
their good sense as conspicuous as the triter. I leave to
" Linear as" all further disquisition on their merits.
Your's, &c.