They have
no time to go to a shade and be refreshed such easement is reserved
for the horses"!--Speech of Hon. P. P. Doddridge in House of
Delegates, 1829.]
All this, you will say, comes too late; the curse is upon you, the evil
in the vitals of your state, the desolation widening day by day. No, it
is not too late. There are elements in the Virginian character capable
of meeting the danger, extreme as it is, and turning it aside. Could you
but forget for a time partisan contest and unprofitable political
speculations, you might successfully meet the dangerous exigencies of
your state with those efficient remedies which the spirit of the age
suggests; you might, and that too without pecuniary loss, relinquish your
claims to human beings as slaves, and employ them as free laborers, under
such restraint and supervision as their present degraded condition may
render necessary. In the language of one of your own citizens, "it is
useless for you to attempt to linger on the skirts of the age which is
departed. The action of existing causes and principles is steady and
progressive.
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