The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1842-07-01 00:00:00

mits to be imperatively requir

our tropical possessions to a s

sperity

To this great

happiness of the African race
Fished, if not an exclusive °hie(

the restoration of

lth and pro-

promotion of the

er been a che-

and by the work-
feel bound

far, w

Ing of the emancipation bill, t
to admit that that object has been obtained. Let us
beg their attention, on this point, to the following evi-
dence of a witness—the Guiana limes of the 13th of
May—whose testimony will at least receive the credit
of being impartial :

" If we art! not

of men, and to say that this comma

proved in point of virtuous princiE
be disputed, that the strides whi
ternal decorum, which is like t

hearts and consciences

s a whole, has im-

ist; is not to

h it has made in that ex-

ge that vice pays to

f all but pe.

virtue, must outstrip the highest concep,..--
sonal observers. The degradation and inhumanity of a ge-
neral system of licentiousness, the prevalence of the insti-
tution of marriage has everywhere rectified. The river no
longer resounds, on the peaceful Sabbath-day, with the forced
mirth of the children of bondage, plying their unintermitted
tasks ; but every thorou-“ -rowded with well-dressed

peasants, independently following the bent of pious inclina-
tions, and thronging to the places of divine worship. Even
among the late owners of slave property, to be immoral has
become unfashionable, and to be profane is no longer ac-
counted genteel."
Again—.

" Crimes are not disproportionately numerous or heinous.
Want, the tempter to so many deviations ftom propriety of

conduct, is unknown to the great mass, while the indolence
induced by the climate, indisposes them to the violent and
long-sustained bursts of passion, familiar to regions in which
all the faculties of the mind are in a state of constant acti-
vity and energy. Lying, thieving,-eunning and other vices
and defects, have ceased to characterise, peculiarly, the
labourer in these parts, as he, ceasing to be the abject instru-
ment of another's will, has acquired self-respect, and learned
fit notions of the value of a good reputation. In respect of
these and similar results of the passing of the Emancipation
Act, we encounter few planters even, hardy enough to pre-
tend to doubt the happiness of the change which has been
so suddenly accomplished."
Surely this is a state of thing

both as regards the

improved condition of 1..._
the advanced morality of the society
which will be contemplated with delight by every abo-
litionist—by every lover of the human race.

emancipated African and

.n which he lives

But the

grave question will present itself,—is this a permanent
improvement? Can this happy condition of the Afri-
can co-exist with diminished production, diminished
exports, and diminished imports ? Can it co-exist
with the annihilation of invested capital and the gra-
dual banishment of European intelligence from our
West Indian possessions,
of the same authority from which we have before
quoted :

" Could the present state of affairs remain stationary,
they who insist on securing,
mthigehtgreatest happiness of the
greatest number of persons
, that the distress
of the intelligent was of no consideration,argue when weighed
against the happiness of'the mass. Butarocess is at work,
and by, involve the peasantry in the same which will, by
ca-
tastrophe, before which their superiors
will say that the riches of the soil will always falling. You
guarantee
them against starvation. Granted. As, however,
you be-
lieve that man is born to some higher end than er
animal en-
joyment ; that, as he cannot be always eating, drinking,
sleeping, there are some rational occupations which longEhatntdo
fill up the intervals that appetite leaves vacant ; and thattl he
has faculties to improve, separate from, the limbs of his body,
have

a spiritual existence which is to last long after thL.
crumbled to dust, geu.lemen of the Anti-
we warn You'
very party, of the perils to which your mistaken kindness
subjects your favourik
of a middle class, beta L
plantations and the proprit
before them a prospect of advb.
will be a fatal day for them and t
tivation of their staples is total'
know not how, in the absence
the toil which the freeholders have Lis—,
any inducement to undertake, the educate
rising is to find employment. It is trul'
the number of young persons, of all
for want of oectioatin„

As the component parts

ing drudges of the

new freemen will see

:es without limit. But it

-.-
heir families when the cul-

...
abandoned. Indeed, we

;rants to ur

ertake

nd never will have,

partment, is

incumbehts

generation nos,

to see
to IV I CCli

lancholy

The misfortune is,

that this is a country in which the deprava,—
faculty, and the (deterioration of the understanding, are as
precipitate as the putrescence of animal matter after the
withdrawal of the principle of life."

on of the moral