An Essay on the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species, Particularly the African - Translated from a Latin Dissertation, Which Was Honoured with the First Prize in the University of Cambridge, for the Year 1785, with Additions by Thomas Clarkson
page 62 of 198 (31%)
page 62 of 198 (31%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
Hence then was _society_ formed on the grand principles of
preservation and defence: and as these principles began to operate, in the different parts of the earth, where the different families had roamed, a great number of these _societies_ began to be formed and established; which, taking to themselves particular names from particular occurrences, began to be perfectly distinct from one another. As the individuals, of whom these societies were composed, had associated only for their defence, so they experienced, at first, no change in their condition. They were still independent and free; they were still without discipline or laws; they had every thing still in common; they pursued the same, manner of life; wandering only, in _herds_, as the earth gave them or refused them sustenance, and doing, as a _publick body_, what they had been accustomed to do as _individuals_ before. This was the exact situation of the Getæ and Scythians[037], of the Lybians and Goetulians[038], of the Italian Aborigines[039], and of the Huns and Alans[040]. They had left their original state of _dissociation_, and had stepped into that, which has been just described. Thus was the second situation of men a state of _independent society_. Having thus joined themselves together, and having formed themselves into several large and distinct bodies, they could not fail of submitting soon to a more considerable change. Their numbers must have rapidly increased, and their societies, in process of time, have become so populous, as frequently to have experienced the want of subsistence, and many of the commotions and tumults of intestine strife. For these inconveniences however there were remedies to be found. _Agriculture_ would furnish them with that subsistence and support, which the earth, from the rapid increase of its inhabitants, had become |
|