was all the tribute that the renters of lands were obliged to pay to the king, which when collected from all parts of the empire would make a revenue sufficient to support the government.

We shall now inquire whether this new financial scheme tended to injure or to promote the general welfare of the nation; and, first, it established upon a permanent foundation an ample support to government.

Secondly-It secured to the people from generation to generation a competent support, by establishing to them an inalienable right to four-fifths of the increase of the lands, and thus prevented them from ever being subject to the mercy of oppressive landlords. It is a well known fact that the lands of all countries which are long inhabited, become the exclusive property of an opulent few, while the great mass of the people become renters, and that the rule by which land-holders let their fields or farms to individuals, is not by the intrinsic value of the increase, or what they may lawfully exact from the renter, but what is the highest he can pay consistent with his bare subsistence. In many parts of the United States it is common for renters to pay one-half the increase of the soil; but in most of European countries, after rents are paid, toll, tribute and custom discharged, most of renters would count themselves very safe if they could save one-fifth. Joseph's plan, while it restrained the power of the king from ever demanding more than the fifth, it secured the people against the unbounded avarice of landlords. The king was landlord of the whole, and he was bound by an established rule, beyond which he could not go.

Thus it appears that Joseph's method of buying the Egyptians and their lands, was so far from enslaving them, that it was the wisest plan that ever was or could be invented to secure them against being slaves either to the king or to one another; and it is highly probable that the establishment of this wise scheme was the cause that Egypt at an early period excelled all other kingdoms in wealth, power and learning, and an experience of its happy effects might have been a reason why the Egyptians deified Joseph after his death.

A METHOD PROPOSED TO PREVENT ANY DANGEROUS CONSEQUENCES FROM A GENERAL EMANCIPATION OF THE SLAVES.

Although it is impossible to hold any of mankind in a state of unmerited, involuntary, hereditary slavery, without contracting guilt, yet in effecting their general emancipation, such a method ought to be adopted as in the event will be most likely to prove a benefit to the blacks when free, and be no detriment to the peace of society at large.

With much diffidence we shall suggest the following

method.

First. In connection with the law of general emancipation, let laws be made for a time to govern them when free, which will in some respects be only an improvement of some of those laws which were formerly made to govern them when in a state of bondage. Let the blacks when free have the privilege of education, without restraint.

Secondly. Let them be admitted to bear testimony in courts of justice as soon as they are competent to know the nature of an oath.

than

Thirdly. Let no black person be found traveling more miles from his place of residence, without he can give a satisfactory account of his business, or have a pass from a magistrate.

Fourthly. Let no black man be seen carrying a gun or any destructive weapon without license from a magistrate or some other official character.

Fifthly. Let the blacks have a right to buy, sell, and traffic with the whites in any form they may see fit.

Sixthly. Let them have the privilege of meeting together for public worship without any restraint.

Seventhly. Let patroles be continued for some time in every district where the blacks are numerous, but let them have no power to beat or in any way abuse a black person, should they find him transgressing the law, but let them take him to a magistrate to have his cause tried.

Eighthly. Let magistrates have full power for a time

to take cognizance of all petty crimes of the blacks, but let none such be tried but by a jury of from six to twelve men, and to prevent jealousies, and encourage the blacks, one-half of such juries might be of the blacks.

Ninthly.- Where the blacks are numerous in a district, let magistrates and constables be proportionably nume

rous.

NOTE.

The "Appendix" is retained here, because it was a part of the original publication, and not because it is deemed an appropriate conclusion to so masterly an argument. It may, however, be instructive, even now, on two points; one is, to show by an actual experiment, that a clear exhibition of the sinfulness of slavery and the duty of immediate emancipation, but accompanied with practical provisions for degrading and disfranchising the freed man, did not in fact render the doctrine at all more palatable to the slaveholders, than it has been since, when coupled with the uncompromising demands of "modern abolition ;" and the other is, that the clearest exhibitions of sin and duty in the case fell power. less upon the public mind, until in the year 1831, they were faithfully and fearlessly carried out to their just conclusions, and embo. died in a public society for the purpose of carrying them into ef. fect. In no other way can it be rationally accounted for, that a work, written with such power, should have fallen so ineffectual upon the public mind, and passed so soon into entire oblivion.-ED New York, 1840.