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THE

INTERESTING NARRATIVE

OF

THE LIFE

OF

OLAUDAH EQUIANO,

OR

GUSTAVUS VASSA,

THE AFRICAN.

_WRITTEN BY HIMSELF._


_Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust and not be
afraid, for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my
song; he also is become my salvation.
And in that shall ye say, Praise the Lord, call upon his
name, declare his doings among the people. Isaiah xii. 2, 4._



LONDON:

Printed for and sold by the Author, No. 10, Union-Street,
Middlesex Hospital


Sold also by Mr. Johnson, St. Paul's Church-Yard; Mr.
Murray, Fleet-Street; Messrs. Robson and Clark, Bond-Street;
Mr. Davis, opposite Gray's Inn, Holborn; Messrs. Shepperson
and Reynolds, and Mr. Jackson, Oxford Street; Mr.
Lackington, Chiswell-Street; Mr. Mathews, Strand; Mr.
Murray, Prince's-Street, Soho; Mess. Taylor and Co. South
Arch, Royal Exchange; Mr. Button, Newington-Causeway; Mr.
Parsons, Paternoster-Row; and may be had of all the
Booksellers in Town and Country.

[Entered at Stationer's Hall.]




[Illustration: Olaudah Equiano or GUSTAVUS VASSA, _the African_]




To the Lords Spiritual and Temporal, and the Commons of the
Parliament of Great Britain.


_My Lords and Gentlemen_,

Permit me, with the greatest deference and respect, to lay at your
feet the following genuine Narrative; the chief design of which is to
excite in your august assemblies a sense of compassion for the
miseries which the Slave-Trade has entailed on my unfortunate
countrymen. By the horrors of that trade was I first torn away from
all the tender connexions that were naturally dear to my heart; but
these, through the mysterious ways of Providence, I ought to regard as
infinitely more than compensated by the introduction I have thence
obtained to the knowledge of the Christian religion, and of a nation
which, by its liberal sentiments, its humanity, the glorious freedom
of its government, and its proficiency in arts and sciences, has
exalted the dignity of human nature.

I am sensible I ought to entreat your pardon for addressing to you a
work so wholly devoid of literary merit; but, as the production of an
unlettered African, who is actuated by the hope of becoming an
instrument towards the relief of his suffering countrymen, I trust
that _such a man_, pleading in _such a cause_, will be acquitted of
boldness and presumption.

May the God of heaven inspire your hearts with peculiar benevolence on
that important day when the question of Abolition is to be discussed,
when thousands, in consequence of your Determination, are to look for
Happiness or Misery!

I am,
My Lords and Gentlemen,
Your most obedient,
And devoted humble Servant,
Olaudah Equiano,

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