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turning to page one
As the slaves continue to work, there is a conversation going on between Epps and Bass. Bass much skilled in the art of sophistry, while Epps's arguments are fueled mostly by emotion alone. Though at first Epps does little more than joke his way around the facts.
Solomon, working still, can't help but overhear.
BASS
I tell you what it is, Epps. It's
all wrong. All wrong, sir.
There's no justice nor
righteousness in slavery. I
wouldn't own a slave if I was rich
as Croesus, which I am not, as is
perfectly well understood. More
particularly among my creditors.
There's another humbug: the credit
system. Humbug, sir. No credit,
no debt. Credit leads a man into
temptation. Cash down is the only
thing that will deliver him from
evil. But this question of
slavery; what right have you to
your niggers when you come down to
the point?
EPPS
What right? I bought 'em. I paid
for 'em.
BASS
Of course you did. The law says
you have the right to hold a
nigger, but begging the law's
pardon...it lies.
EPPS
You are daft.
BASS
Yes, Epps, when the law says that
it's a liar, and the truth is not
in it. Is everything right
because the law allows it?
Suppose they'd pass a law taking
away your liberty and making you a
slave?
EPPS
That ain't a supposable case.
Hope you don't compare me to a
nigger, Bass.
BASS
In the sight of God, what is the
difference, Epps, between a white
man and a black one?
EPPS
Yah might as well ask what the
difference is between a white man
and a baboon. Now, I seen one of
them critters in Orleans that
knowed just as much as any nigger
I got. Yah'd call them fellers
citizens, I s'pose?
BASS
Look here, Epps. You can't laugh
me down in that way.
(pointed)
Some men are witty, and some ain't
so witty as they think they are.
But let that pass. These niggers
are human beings. If they don't
know as much as their masters,
whose fault is it? They are not
allowed to know anything. You
have books and papers, and can go
where you please, and gather
intelligence in a thousand ways.
But your slaves have no
privileges. You'd whip one of
them if caught reading a book.
They are held in bondage,
generation after generation,
deprived of mental improvement.
Who can expect them to posses much
knowledge If they are not brought
down to a level with the brute
creation, you slaveholders will
never be blamed for it. If they
are baboons, or stand no higher in
scale of intelligence than such
animals, you and men like you will
have to answer for it. There's a
sin, a fearful sin, resting on
this nation that will not go
unpunished forever. There will be
a reckoning yet.
The "funny" has completely gone out of the conversation for Epps. Quite coldly:
EPPS
You like to hear yourself talk,
Bass, better than any man I know
of. Yah'd argue that black was
white, or white black if anybody
would contradict you. A fine
supposition if yah lived among
Yankees in New England. But yah
don't. You most assuredly do not.