Such was the plan of Mr. Sharp for the French islands. Representatives from thence were to hold a seat, both for blacks and whites, in the National Assembly: but they were to have no assemblies of their own whereby to legislate in their own land.

It cannot be doubted, after the account which we have now given of Mr. Granville Sharp, that he must have been held in great estimation both at home and in foreign parts. This was really the case. At home he was almost continually harassed by applications from others to take a part in their affairs, and to see that justice was done them where they had considered themselves to be aggrieved. There was also such a general notion of his integrity and justice, that many, both friends and strangers, pressed him to become the executor of their wills, and the guardian of their children. Mr. Sharp was willing to oblige all. We do not now recollect for how many persons he was at one time a disinterested agent in such concerns; but it was so great, that the office became an entire burthen upon his time; and he was obliged at last to prevent the spreading of the evil by refusing all other applications of the same kind. With respect to countries abroad, he was esteemed no where more than in those which were afterwards called the United States. The Congress had such an opinion of his uprightness, that they selected him without his knowledge as a mediator between themselves and the Government of Great Britain in their dispute with the latter. To forward their design, they sent Dr. Franklin and Silas Deane, both of celebrated memory, to Paris. These found an opportunity there of corresponding with Mr. Sharp, and of sending him their proposals. Mr. Sharp accepted the commission. He wrote accordingly to Lord George Germaine, who was then in office, and the minister proper to be applied to on the occasion. A correspondence took place in consequence between them, which, as we know it was preserved by Mr. Sharp, must be now in the possession of his family. Mr. Sharp was authorized to state, that if the British Government would resolve upon a parliamentary reform, and admit a certain number of representatives from America to sit in it (which latter was the only mode of colonial representation consistent with the spirit of the English constitution), the Congress would be satisfied, and that America should be saved to the mother country. It is only necessary to add, that the proposals were rejected, and that the independence of America followed.

Mr. Granville Sharp was a member of the Church of England, to which both he and his ancestors were attached in an extraordinary manner from its very institution. The latter indeed had mostly, one or other of them, belonged to it as clerical persons. He was, however, a friend to religious liberty as

far as the Protestant cause prevailed, having a regard for, and mixing harmoniously with, dissenters of different denominations, and desirous that they should have equal privileges with the rest of their fellow citizens. He was not, however, equally liberal to the Roman Catholic subjects of the realm. He had no personal dislike to them, but he bore the most implacable hatred to their religion. He had indeed a real horror of it. He never could forget the spirit of persecution which their church had manifested in so many ages against those who had dared to think in religious matters independently for themselves; so that all the burnings in Smithfield, and the massacres and cruelties committed by them in other places, always rose up to his mind whenever he talked concerning it. It was his opinion, too, that Roman Catholicism was not Christianity, but a most gross perversion of it, or that it was Antichrist itself, which it was predicted should eventually fall. Hence, when the Catholics agitated their claims in Parliament last year, he was a strenuous opposer of them, and became even the Chairman of a Committee for that purpose. We may say, however, of Mr. Sharp, that though he took such a bitter part against them, he would not have injured even a hair of their heads, and much less would he have allowed of any persecution of them on account of their tenets, or the devotional exercises of their faith. It was his opinion, that they had sufficient privileges (such as the power of electing their own clergy, and the power of worshipping where they pleased, and in their own way, together with full protec tion and security therein,) and as many as were consistent with the safety of the Established Church. To the opinions of Mr. Sharp on this subject we ourselves are not friendly. It is but justice, however, to say, that they were not adopted by him till after the most serious consideration for years, and that they were then adopted only as the genuine result of his own conviction.

Ac

Mr. Sharp died at the advanced age of 79. When his lamented death became known, the African Institution, desirous of paying respect to his remains, sent to the family to know how far it would be agreeable that a Deputation should accompany them to the grave. The family accepted it as a proper honour. cordingly six persons, among whom was Mr. Wilberforce, followed the body to its last earthly home; that body, which, when animated by life and intelligence, had displayed such energy in their cause; and which, though now dead, they trusted had been fitted by its glorious exertions for that still more glorious one, by which it would be rendered capable of enjoying the resurrection of the just.

Buenos Ayres, decree to abolish Slave Indian hospitality, 71.

-, proceedings in Parlia- Slave Trade, 74, 181, 308.

Poor, progress of association for relief Small Pox, 180, 296.

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