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 Summary:
Recently returned from her trip to London, during which time Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral , was published, Wheatley was emancipated by her master. This is her first printed work as a freewoman and arguably her strongest denunciation of slavery. Phillis Wheatley (c.1753-1784). Published in The Connecticut Journal and the New-Haven Post Boy, New Haven, April 1, 1774. 4 pp., folio. Inventory# 20922 $9,500 Excerpt: “… in every human Breast, God has implanted a Principle, which we call Love of Freedom; it is impatient of Oppression, and pants for Deliverence; and by the Leave of our modern Egyptians I will assert that the same Principle lives in us. God grant Deliverance in his own Way and Time, and get him honor upon all those whose Avarice impels them to countenance and help forward the Calamities of their fellow Creatures. This I desire not for their Hurt, but to convince them of the strange Absurdity of their Conduct whose Words and Actions are so diametrically opposite. How well the cry for Liberty, and the reverse Disposition for the exercise of oppressive Power over others agree,-- I humbly think it does not require the Penetration of a Philosopher to determine.’—” Historical Background: In this epistle, Wheatley corresponds with Rev. Samson Occum, who, back in 1765, was her first known correspondent. Occum (1723-1792), also a poet, was a Mohegan-born Christian missionary to the Montauks. This letter (originally of February 11, 1775) comments on his indictment of slave-holding Christian ministers. She keenly points out the discrepancy between American colonists’ demands for freedom from Britain and their determination to uphold slavery.
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