William Wilberforce

One year after his conversion, God's apparent calling on his life had become clear to him. On October 28,1787, he wrote in his diary, "God Almighty has placed before me two great Objects: the Suppression of the Slave Trade and the Reformation of Manners [morals]."

Soon after Christmas, 1787, a few days before the parliamentary recess, Wilberforce gave notice in the House of Commons that early in the new session he would bring a motion for the abolition of the slave trade.

It would be 20 years before he could carry the House of Commons and the House of Lords in putting abolition into law. But the more he studied the matter and the more he heard of the atrocities, the more resolved he became.

In May 1789, he spoke to the House about how he came to his conviction:

"I confess to you, so enormous, so dreadful, so irremediable did its wickedness appear that my own mind was completely made up for Abolition . . . Let the consequences be what they would, I from this time determined that I would never rest until I had effected its abolition."

Later that year, he said: "I mean not to accuse anyone, but to take the shame upon myself - in common indeed with the whole Parliament of Great Britain - for having suffered this horrid trade to be carried on under their authority. We are all guilty-we ought all to plead guilty, and not to exculpate ourselves by throwing the blame on others."

In 1793, he wrote to a supporter who thought he was growing soft and cautious in the cause:

"If I thought the immediate Abolition of the Slave Trade would cause an insurrection in our islands, I should not for an instant remit my most strenuous endeavours. Be persuaded, then: I shall still less ever make this grand cause the sport of the caprice, or sacrifice it to motives of political convenience or personal feeling."

In Amazing Grace, William Wilberforce presents a huge anti-slavery petition to Parliament.

"If it please God to honour me so far, may I be the instrument of stopping such a course of wickedness and cruelty as never before disgraced a Christian country."

Of course, the opposition that raged for these 20 years was because of the financial benefits of slavery to the traders and to the British economy, because of what the plantations in the West Indies produced. They could not conceive of any way to produce without slave labour.

This meant that Wilberforce's life was threatened more than once. When he criticized the credibility of a slave ship captain, Robert Norris, the man was enraged, and Wilberforce feared for his life.

Short of physical harm, there was the painful loss of friends. Some would no longer fight with him, and they were estranged.

In 1787, Wilberforce wrote a letter in which he estimated that the annual revenue from the export of slaves from the western coast of Africa for all nations exceeded £100,000 . . . In 1804, he estimated that for the Guiana importation alone, 12,000 to 15,000 human beings were enslaved every year the trade continued.

One year after his conversion, God's apparent calling on his life had become clear to him. On October 28,1787, he wrote in his diary, "God Almighty has placed before me two great Objects: the Suppression of the Slave Trade and the Reformation of Manners [morals]."

Soon after Christmas, 1787, a few days before the parliamentary recess, Wilberforce gave notice in the House of Commons that early in the new session he would bring a motion for the abolition of the slave trade.

It would be 20 years before he could carry the House of Commons and the House of Lords in putting abolition into law. But the more he studied the matter and the more he heard of the atrocities, the more resolved he became.

In May 1789, he spoke to the House about how he came to his conviction:

"I confess to you, so enormous, so dreadful, so irremediable did its wickedness appear that my own mind was completely made up for Abolition . . . Let the consequences be what they would, I from this time determined that I would never rest until I had effected its abolition."

Later that year, he said: "I mean not to accuse anyone, but to take the shame upon myself - in common indeed with the whole Parliament of Great Britain - for having suffered this horrid trade to be carried on under their authority. We are all guilty-we ought all to plead guilty, and not to exculpate ourselves by throwing the blame on others."

In 1793, he wrote to a supporter who thought he was growing soft and cautious in the cause:

"If I thought the immediate Abolition of the Slave Trade would cause an insurrection in our islands, I should not for an instant remit my most strenuous endeavours. Be persuaded, then: I shall still less ever make this grand cause the sport of the caprice, or sacrifice it to motives of political convenience or personal feeling."

Three years later, almost 10 years after the battle was begun, he wrote: "Before this great cause, all others dwindle in my eyes; and I must say that the certainty that I am right here, adds greatly to the complacency with which I exert myself in asserting it.

"If it please God to honour me so far, may I be the instrument of stopping such a course of wickedness and cruelty as never before disgraced a Christian country."

Of course, the opposition that raged for these 20 years was because of the financial benefits of slavery to the traders and to the British economy, because of what the plantations in the West Indies produced. They could not conceive of any way to produce without slave labour.

This meant that Wilberforce's life was threatened more than once. When he criticized the credibility of a slave ship captain, Robert Norris, the man was enraged, and Wilberforce feared for his life.

Short of physical harm, there was the painful loss of friends. Some would no longer fight with him, and they were estranged.

Then there was the huge political pressure to back down because of the international political ramifications. For example, if Britain really outlawed slavery, the West Indian colonial assemblies threatened to declare independence from Britain and to federate with the United States. These kinds of financial and political arguments held Parliament captive for decades.

But the night - or I should say early morning - of victory came in 1807. The moral vision and the political momentum for abolition had finally become irresistible.

As John Pollock recounts in Wilberforce, at one point "the House rose almost to a man and turned towards Wilberforce in a burst of Parliamentary cheers. Suddenly, above the roar of 'Hear, hear,' and quite out of order, three hurrahs echoed and echoed - while he sat, head bowed, tears streaming down his face."

At 4 am, February 24, 1807, the House divided: Ayes, 283; Noes, 16; majority for the abolition, 267. And on March 25, 1807, the royal assent was declared.

One of Wilberforce's friends wrote: "[Wilberforce] attributes it to the immediate interposition of Providence." In that early morning hour, Wilberforce turned to his best friend and colleague, Henry Thornton, and said: "Well, Henry, what shall we abolish next?"

Of course, the battle wasn't over. And Wilberforce fought on until his death 26 years later in 1833.

Not only was the implementation of the abolition law controversial and difficult, but all it did was abolish the slave trade, not slavery itself. That became the next major cause. In 1821 Wilberforce recruited Thomas Fowell Buxton to carry on the fight - and from the sidelines, aged and fragile, he cheered him on.

Three months before his death in 1833, he was persuaded to propose a last petition against slavery. "I had never thought to appear in public again, but it shall never be said that William Wilberforce is silent while the slaves require his help."

The decisive vote of victory for that one came on July 26, 1833, only three days before Wilberforce died. Slavery itself was outlawed in the British colonies. Minor work on the legislation took several more days.

"It is a singular fact," Buxton said, "that on the very night on which we were successfully engaged in the House of Commons, in passing the clause of the Act of Emancipation - one of the most important clauses ever enacted . . . the spirit of our friend left the world. The day which was the termination of his labours was the termination of his life."

William Cowper wrote a sonnet to celebrate Wilberforce's labour for the slaves, which begins with these lines:

"Thy country, Wilberforce, with just disdain / Hears thee by cruel men and impious call'd / Fanatic, for thy zeal to loose the enthrall'd / From exile, public sale, and slavery's chain / Friend of the poor, the wrong'd, the fetter-gall'd / Fear not lest labour such as thine be vain."

Wilberforce's friend and sometimes pastor, William Jay, wrote a tribute with this accurate prophecy:

"His disinterested, self-denying, laborious, undeclining efforts in this cause of justice and humanity . . . will call down the blessings of millions; and ages yet to come will glory in his memory."

From Amazing Grace in the Life of William Wilberforce by John Piper © 2007, pages 19, 35 - 40. Used by permission of Crossway Books, a division of Good News Publishers, Wheaton, Il 60187, www.crossway.com.

Mission Fields Spring 2007