This then was the time for beginning the abolition.

But he would now observe, that five years had elapsed since these documents were framed; and therefore the presumption was, that the Black population was increasing at an extraordinary rate.

He had not, to be sure, in his consideration of the subject, entered into the dreadful mortality arising from the clearing of new lands.

Importations for this purpose were to be considered, not as carrying on the trade, but as setting on foot a Slave-trade, a measure which he believed no one present would then support.

He therefore asked his honourable friend, whether the period he had looked to was now arrived?
whether the West Indies, at this hour, were not in a state, in which they could maintain their population?
It had been argued, that one or other of these two assertions was false; that either the population of the slaves must be decreasing, (which the abolitionists denied,) or, if it was increasing, the slaves must have been well treated.