physical organization fitted him, and him alone, for field labor in
the tropical and semi-tropical regions of the earth. He endures the
sun's heat without pain or exhaustion in this labor, and yet he has
not nor can he acquire the capacity to direct profitably this labor.
It was then the design of the Creator that this labor should be
controlled and directed by a superior intelligence. In the absence of
mental capacity, we find him possessed of equal physical powers with
any other race, with an amiability of temper which submits without
resistance to this control. We find him, too, without moral, social,
or political aspirations, contented and happy in the condition of
servility to this superior intelligence, and rising in the scale of
humanity to a condition which under any other circumstances his race
had never attained. I may be answered that this labor can be had from
the black as a freeman as well as in the condition of a slave. To this
I will simply say, experience has proved this to be an error. Such is
the indolence and unambitious character of the negro that he will not
labor, unless compelled by the apprehension of immediate punishment,
to anything approaching his capacity for labor. His wants are few,
they are easily supplied, and when they are, there is no temptation
which will induce him to work. He cares nothing for social position,
and will steal to supply his necessities, and feel no abasement in the
legal punishment which follows his conviction; nor is his social
status among his race damaged thereby. As a slave to the white man, he
becomes and has proved an eminently useful being to his kind--in every
other condition, equally conspicuous as a useless one. The fertility
of the soil and the productions of the tropical regions of the earth
demonstrate to the thinking mind that these were to be cultivated and
made to produce for the uses and prosperity of the human family. The
great staples of human necessity and human luxury are produced here in
the greatest abundance, and the great majority of these nowhere else.