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Show :1.54 ON THE SLAVERY AND CoMMERCE an equal degree of enormity, A crime, founded on a dreadful pre-eminence in wickednefs,-a crime, which being both of individuals and the nation, mull: femetime cjraw down upon us the heaviefl: judgment of Almighty God, who made of one blood all the fons of men, and who gave to all equally a natural right to liberty; and who, ruEng all the kingdoms of the earth with equal providential jufl:ice, cannot fuffer fuch deliberate, fuch mon!l:rous iniquity, to pafs long unpunilhcd .. f But alas! he feems already to have interfered on the occafion ! The * violent and fupernatural agitations of all the elements, which, for a feries of years, have prevailed in thofe European fettlements, where the t Sermon preached before the Univerfity of Cambridge, by the Rev. Peter Pecbrd. • The firft noted earthquake at Jamaica, happened June the 7th 169:z, when Port Royal was totally funk. This was fucceedcd by one in the year 1697, and by another in the year 1721~ from which time to the prefcnt, thefe regions of the globe feem to have been fcvcrcly vifitcd, but particularly dur .. ing the laft fix or fcven years. See a general account of the ca1amities, occalioned by the late tremendous hurricanes and earthquakes in the Weft-Indian iflands, by Mr. Fowler. unfortunate oF THE HuMAN SPECIES. unfortunate Africans are retained in a !tate of !lavery, and which have brought unfpeakable calamities on the inhabitants, and publick lolfes on the !l:ates to which they [everally belong, are fo many awful vifitations of God for this inhuman violation of his laws. And it is not perhaps unworthy of remark, that as the fubjeets of Great-Britain have two thirds of this impious commerce in their own hands, fo they have fuffered in the fame proportion, or * more feverely than the re!l:. How far thefe misfortunes may appear to be acrs of providence, and to create an abrm to thofe who have been accu!l:omed to refer every elfeet to its apparent caufe; who have been habituated to !l:op there, and to overlook the finger of God, becaufe it is !lightly covered under the veil of fecondary laws, we will not pretend to determine? but this we will alfert with confidence, that the Europeans have richly deferved them all; • The many Ihips of war belonging to the Britifh navy, which were loft with all their crews in thcfe dreadf1.1l hurri~ canes, will f1.1fficiently prove the faa, that |