But had such a trade as the Slave-trade ever existed before?
Would the noble Earl, who had talked of the slavery of ancient Rome and Greece, assert, that in the course of his whole reading, however profound it might have been, he had found any thing resembling such a traffic?
Where did it appear in history, that ships were regularly fitted out to fetch away tens of thousands of persons annually, against their will, from their native land; that these were subject to personal indignities and arbitrary punishments during their transportation; and that a certain proportion of them, owing to suffocation and other cruel causes, uniformly perished?
He averred, that nothing like the African Slave-trade was ever practised in any nation upon earth.
If the trade then was repugnant, as he maintained it was, to justice and humanity, he did not see how, without aiding and abetting injustice and inhumanity, any man could sanction it: and he thought that the noble baron (Hawkesbury) was peculiarly bound to support the resolution; for he had admitted that if it could be shown, that the trade was contrary to these principles, the question would be at an end.

Now this contrariety had been made apparent, and his lordship had not even attempted to refute it.
He would say but little on the subject of revealed religion, as it related to this question, because the reverend prelate, near him, had spoken so fully upon it.

He might observe, however, that at the end of the sixth year, when the Hebrew slave was emancipated, he was to be furnished liberally from the flock, the floor, and the wine-press of his master.
Lord Holland lamented the unfaithfulness of the noble baron (Hawkesbury) to his own principles, and the inflexible opposition of the noble earl (Westmoreland), from both which circumstances he despaired for ever of any assistance from them to this glorious cause.

The latter wished to hear evidence on the subject, for the purpose, doubtless, of delay.

He was sure, that the noble earl did not care what the evidence would say on either side; for his mind was made up, that the trade ought not to be abolished.
The noble earl had made a difference between humanity, justice, and sound policy.