Walkers Appeal, with a Brief Sketch of His Life | Page 3

the Roman
Slaves, which last, were made up from almost every nation under
heaven, whose sufferings under those ancient and heathen nations were,
in comparison with ours, under this enlightened and christian nation, no
more than a cypher--or in other words, those heathen nations of

antiquity, had but little more among them than the name and form of
slavery, while wretchedness and endless miseries were reserved,
apparently in a phial, to be poured out upon our fathers, ourselves and
our children by christian Americans!
These positions, I shall endeavour, by the help of the Lord, to
demonstrate in the course of this appeal, to the satisfaction of the most
incredulous mind--and may God Almighty who is the father of our
Lord Jesus Christ, open your hearts to understand and believe the truth.
The causes, my brethren, which produce our wretchedness and miseries,
are so very numerous and aggravating, that I believe the pen only of a
Josephus or a Plutarch, can well enumerate and explain them. Upon
subjects, then, of such incomprehensible magnitude, so impenetrable,
and so notorious, I shall be obliged to omit a large class of, and content
myself with giving you an exposition of a few of those, which do
indeed rage to such an alarming pitch, that they cannot but be a
perpetual source of terror and dismay to every reflecting mind.
I am fully aware, in making this appeal to my much afflicted and
suffering brethren, that I shall not only be assailed by those whose
greatest earthly desires are, to keep us in abject ignorance and
wretchedness, and who are of the firm conviction that heaven has
designed us and our children to be slaves and beasts of burden to them
and their children.--I say, I do not only expect to be held up to the
public as an ignorant, impudent and restless disturber of the public
peace, by such avaricious creatures, as well as a mover of
insubordination--and perhaps put in prison or to death, for giving a
superficial exposition of our miseries, and exposing tyrants. But I am
persuaded, that many of my brethren, particularly those who are
ignorantly in league with slave-holders or tyrants, who acquire their
daily bread by the blood and sweat of their more ignorant brethren--and
not a few of those too, who are too ignorant to see an inch beyond their
noses, will rise up and call me cursed--Yea, the jealous ones among us
will perhaps use more abject subtlety by affirming that this work is not
worth perusing; that we are well situated and there is no use in trying to
better our condition, for we cannot. I will ask one question here.--Can

our condition be any worse?--Can it be more mean and abject? If there
are any changes, will they not be for the better, though they may appear
for the worse at first? Can they get us any lower? Where can they get us?
They are afraid to treat us worse, for they know well, the day they do it
they are gone. But against all accusations which may or can be
preferred against me, I appeal to heaven for my motive in writing--who
knows that my object is, if possible, to awaken in the breasts of my
afflicted, degraded and slumbering brethren, a spirit of enquiry and
investigation respecting our miseries and wretchedness in this
_Republican Land of Liberty!!!!!_
The sources from which our miseries are derived and on which I shall
comment, I shall not combine in one, but shall put them under distinct
heads and expose them in their turn; in doing which, keeping truth on
my side, and not departing from the strictest rules of morality, I shall
endeavor to penetrate, search out, and lay them open for your
inspection. If you cannot or will not profit by them, I shall have done
my duty to you, my country and my God.
And as the inhuman system of slavery, is the source from which most
of our miseries proceed, I shall begin with that _curse to nations_;
which has spread terror and devastation through so many nations of
antiquity, and which is raging to such a pitch at the present day in
Spain and in Portugal. It had one tug in England, in France, and in the
United States of America; yet the inhabitants thereof, do not learn
wisdom, and erase it entirely from their dwellings and from all with
whom they have to do. The fact is, the labor of slaves comes so cheap
to the avaricious usurpers, and is (as they think) of such great utility to
the country where it exists, that those who are actuated by sordid
avarice only, overlook the evils, which will as sure as the Lord lives,
follow after the good. In fact, they are