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He calls upon us to believe that, in spite of being free, educated, progressive, and at peace with all men, we West Indian Blacks, were we ever to become constitutionally dominant in our native islands, would emulate in savagery our Haytian fellow-Blacks who, at the time of retaliating upon their actual masters, were tortured slaves, bleeding and rendered desperate under the oppressors' lash and all this simply and merely because of the sameness of our ancestry and the colour of our skin!
If they lost their ears, they enjoyed the satisfaction of making those of their oppressors tingle. Knowing their persecutors to be in the wrong, they did not always inquire whether they themselves had been entirely right, and had done no unrequired works of supererogation by the way of "testimony" against their neighbors' mode cf worship.
Precisely the same thing was said of the slaves in the South. Indeed, the same argument, variously worded, has been used by oppressors in all ages. "Ye are idle, ye are idle," is a very old cry. But, admitting that some women are injudicious and occasionally one is irreverent, are not men, in advocating their peculiar views on politics, the same, only in much larger proportion?
It is no longer the case of free men in a vague and dubious position, unsuccessfully defending, against the nomination of the chieftains whose lands they inhabit, the wreck of their independence, whether Gallic, or Roman, or barbaric; it is the case of burgesses, agriculturists, and serfs, who know well what their grievances and who their oppressors are, and who are working to get free.
By them these Widdringtons had long been feared and detested, and only the belief in the minds of those simple country folk that, in some mysterious way beyond their ken, the law was on the side of their oppressors, had on more than one occasion prevented an outbreak of popular fury.
On this subject the High Churchman and the Low Churchman were of one mind, or rather the Low Churchman was the more angry of the two. A man like South, who had during many years been predicting that, if ever the Puritans ceased to be oppressed, they would become oppressors, was at heart not ill pleased to see his prophecy fulfilled.
His late tour of the island was a triumphal procession, amid the sycophantic greetings of oppressors. Several special magistrates have been suspended because of the faithful discharge of their duties. Among these was Dr. Palmer, an independent and courageous man.
"I told you," he said, "that this day would come. One grand hope was given to your countrymen; they cast it from them! Ages on ages shall pass before they learn the loftiness of that hope, or fulfill the punishment of that rejection. Yet, in the fullness of time, light shall break upon their darkness. They shall ask: Why are barbarians and civilised alike our oppressors?
Of the two special oppressors, William Fitz-Osbern had thrown away his life in Flanders; but Bishop Ode was still at work, till several years later his king and brother struck him down with a truly righteous blow. The year 1074, not a year of fighting, was pro-eminently a year of intrigue.
He bids them take firm hold on the precepts of God; warns them not to wax proud before God and His loved ones; recalls the tribulations, and extols the virtues, of the Imám Ḥusayn; prays that He Himself may suffer similar afflictions; prophesies that erelong God will raise up a people who will recount His troubles and demand the restitution of His rights from His oppressors; and calls upon them to give ear to His words, and return unto God and repent.