Captain Willets Departure affords us an early opportunity of acknowledging the receipt of your favour of the 20th of May enclosing a copy of the Constitution of your Society, and also copies of Letters from the Governors of New Hamshire & Connecticut to your President. From many wise rules & regulations adopted in the former we perceive with satisfaction that your Body has acquired a Stability commensurate to the purposes of its institution; and from the latter, that the cause in which you are engaged, is countenanced in the governments alluded to by the authority of laws, & the Co-operation of powerfull friends & patrons.

In return you will rejoice to be informed, that many such friends & patrons are daily standing forth here, in behalf of the natives of Africa, whose peculier wretchedness, long overlooked in the mass of human misery, seems at this time to excite a general attention.

Upwards of an hundred petitions having been presented to Parliament, some soliciting, in unqualified terms, the Abolition of a traffic so disgraceful to humanity, and others urging the duty of an immediate inquiry into its nature & circumstances, the House of Commons pledged itself to take up the business early in the next Sessions. Meanwhile a Bill which hath for its object the more humane treatment of the Negroes on their passage hath been brought in by a Baronet of distinguished benevolence, and is since enacted into a Law. Great opposition was given to this Bill in every state of its progress. It was even asserted that the proposed regulations would extend to the annihilation of the Trade. On which occasion, a Gentleman high in office, after repeating his former determination to reserve his opinion upon the general Question till it should come under the fair discussion of Parliament, scrupled not to declare, in substance, that if the Trade could not exist under the proposed regulations, humanity called for its extinction. Other members, not tied up by the reservation attatched to responsibility, fearlessly avowed the principle, that arguments drawn from policy were nugatory, when contrasted with the rights of nature, and the maxims of the Christian Religion. For ourselves, we remained silent Spectators of the passing of this Bill, dreading lest any interference on our part, towards the support of Regulations in this commerce, should be construed into an admission of its principle. We are willing however to hope that this mutilated act of mercy, being all that could be procured at this time, may produce some temporary benefit; and we have the satisfaction to assure you, that even the interested evidence which was brought against the measure tended to confirm the truth of those cruelties which this bill is designed to obviate.

Notwithstanding these encouraging circumstances, we feel we have many difficulties to encounter; but as we in part foresaw, so we have been preparing to meet them by every exertion in our power. For this purpose a body of authentic evidence has been accumulated, extending to various parts of this business, and from which, we trust, it will appear that sound policy & humanity call equally for the excision of this iniquitous traffic. The House of Commons not admitting any but parole testimony, we shall also be able to produce at their bar witnesses of much respectabiltiy & information. In the mean time our adversaries in print have been answered by fair argument, and the public opinion, as far as we may be supposed to know it, does credit to the national humanity. On this point we have only to observe further, that, whilst thus addressing the Representatives of a Commercial nation on an affair in which its interests & its justice are inseparable, we cannot for a moment abandon the fundamental principle of our association, that no gains, however great, are to be put in competition with the essential rights of man, and that as a nation is exalted by righteousness, so it is equally debased & debilitated by the revenues of injustice.

We have received & duly acknowledged an obliging letter from Mr Dupont of Paris enclosing him at the same time such Tracts as we judged might assist in forwarding the views of the Society inFrance, & requesting the continuance of his communications.

The disinterested zeal which, on this occasion, is discovering itself in different countries, the exertions of confederated bodies in some, and of distiguished individuals in others, a state of peace more general than the face of Europe usually exhibits, all seem to mark a peculiar designation in the times, which we cannot contemplate without acknowledging the hand of providence, whose blessing may, without superstition, be hoped for on an attempt to rescue a large portion of his creation from misery & Oppression

The abolition of Slavery in the west Indies, to which the last paragraph in your letter alludes, is an object which the philanthropy of individuals may securely cherish. But as that event can only be effected by such gradual & temperate means as the different Colonial assemblies may adopt, so it is entirely beyond the business of our Society, the sole purpose of whose institution is the abolition of the African Slave Trade. And this just representative of ourselves & our views we thought it our duty not long since to lay before the Public, in answer to the often repeated charge that our endeavours went not only to abolition, but Emancipation; an imputation of little consequence to us individually considered, but big with mischief to the casue in which we are engaged.

The Report of our proceeding being in great forwardness, we shall transmit you copies as soon as completed, and shall rejoice, on every occasion, in an interchange of sentiments and friendly offices.

The Act before alluded to is now enclosed, together with what other publications have lately occurred. I am with great respect and esteem Honble. Gentlemen Your most obedient and most humble Servant