The Complete Antislavery Writings of Anthony Benezet, 1754–1783 by David L. Crosby (review)

There was no more influential antislavery advocate in the eighteenth century than Philadelphia Quaker Anthony Benezet, and his copious correspondence and publications on antislavery were the most important reason for this. David L. Crosby, an emeritus professor of English at Alcorn State University, is a leading expert on Benezet’s publications. He excels on the tricky question of which anonymous antislavery tracts were authored by Benezet, and which not. The earliest publication included in this book, a 1754 epistle on “the buying and keeping of slaves”, was signed by twelve other members of Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, not Benezet, but Crosby has delved into meeting records to argue that the epistle was of Benezet’s authorship. There are other anonymous writings that have often been ascribed to Benezet, but Crosby thinks that others wrote them, and he includes an appendix where he succinctly lays out his case regarding each disputed tract.

Crosby also includes the texts for six antislavery tracts that were written by Benezet and published under his own name. Benezet’s careful marshaling of evidence and argument – he used the writings of historians, travel writers, and slave ship captains among others – is still model discourse for how to present one’s case on a controversial issue. Crosby has tracked down all of Benezet’s sources in this plenteously annotated volume. In addition, Benezet combines his history and geography with carefully honed arguments derived from Christian theology and Enlightenment philosophy. It was an unprecedented range of sources for the time, and with Crosby’s expert guidance, still makes good reading two-and-a-half centuries later.

Still, Benezet’s excellent tracts might well have fallen stillborn from the press, except for Benezet’s formidable skills as a publicist. One of Crosby’s eight chapters illustrates this clearly. Benezet had mailed a copy of his tract, Some Historical Account of Guinea, to numerous friends, including the Methodist John Wesley. Wesley, in turn, was inspired and moved by Benezet’s tract to write and publish in 1774 his own Thoughts upon Slavery. Wesley borrowed extensively from Benezet’s tract, but Benezet, far from being appalled by Wesley’s activity bordering on plagiarism, was delighted that Wesley was helping effectively to spread the antislavery message. Benezet hastened to republish the famous Wesley’s tract, this time in North America, but, Crosby tells us, “not before he added five expansive footnotes and a lengthy afterword,” (197) based partly on the newest books to appear addressing Africa and the slave trade. Crosby provides for us the parts of this work that are unambiguously Benezet’s, the long footnotes and afterword. But, if one wanted to study the full measure of Benezet’s influence, one might go online and read the entire text of the Philadelphia edition of Wesley’s work, with Benezet borrowings embedded in the text as well as Benezet notes added onto it. (See http://docsouth.unc.edu/church/wesley/wesley.html) This work by Wesley (and, we may argue, Benezet) was very influential in arousing what would become a substantial antislavery tradition among many Methodists.

This work will be an essential resource for anyone wishing to research eighteenth century antislavery activity among Quakers and others.