Sure he was that it could not fail to succeed sooner or later.  He highly approved of what Mr. Pitt had said, relative to the language it became us to hold out to foreign powers in case of a clandestine trade.  With respect, however, to the assertion of Sir William Yonge, that a clandestine trade in slaves would be worse than a legal one, he could not admit it.  Such a trade, if it existed at all, ought only to be clandestine.  A trade in human flesh and sinews was so scandalous, that it ought not openly to be carried on by any government whatever, and much less by that of a Christian country.  With regard to the regulation of the Slave-trade, he knew of no such thing as a regulation of robbery and murder.  There was no medium.  The legislature must either abolish it, or plead guilty of all the wickedness which had been shown to attend it.  He would now say a word or two with respect to the conduct of foreign nations on this subject.  It was possible that these, when they heard that the matter had been discussed in that house, might follow the example, or they might go before us and set one themselves.  If this were to happen, though we might be the losers, humanity would be the gainer.  He himself had been thought sometimes to use expressions relative to France, which were too harsh, and as if he could only treat her as the enemy of this country.  Politically speaking, France was our rival.  But he well knew the distinction between political enmity and illiberal prejudice.  If there was any great and enlightened nation in Europe, it was France, which was as likely as any country upon the face of the globe to catch a spark from the light of our fire, and to act upon the present subject with warmth and enthusiasm.  France had often been improperly stimulated by her ambition; and he had no doubt but that, in the present instance, she would readily follow its honourable dictates.

Mr. (now Lord) Grenville would not detain the house by going into a question, which had been so ably argued; but he should not do justice to his feelings, if he did not express publicly to his honourable friend, Mr. Wilberforce, the pleasure he had received from one of the most masterly and eloquent speeches he had ever heard,—­a speech, which, while it did honour to him, entitled him to the thanks of the house, of the people of England, of all Europe, and of the latest posterity.  He approved of the propositions, as the best mode of bringing this great question to a happy issue.  He was pleased also with the language which had been held out with respect to foreign nations, and with our determination to assert our right of preventing our colonies from carrying on any trade, which we had thought it our duty to abandon.

Aldermen Newnham, Sawbridge, and Watson, though they wished well to the cause of humanity, could not, as representatives of the city of London, give their concurrence to a measure, which would injure it so essentially as that of the abolition of the Slave-trade.  This trade might undoubtedly be put under wholesome regulations, and made productive of great commercial advantages.  But, if it were abolished, it would render the city of London one scene of bankruptcy and ruin.  It became the house to take care, while they were giving way to the goodness of their hearts, that they did not contribute to the ruin of the mercantile interests of their country.