ABSTRACT
The Cheap Repository for Moral and Religious Tracts was an important element in the evangelical counter-offensive against irreligiosity in the 1790s. Written in a plain and condescending style and prefaced by crude woodcuts, these teachings imitated popular chap-books. ‘Sent out like sheep in wolves’ clothing’, the tracts peddled Christian propaganda instead of jacobinical pamphlet or scandalous chronicle (Spinney, ‘Repository’, p. 295). Begun in March 1795 by Hannah More and members of the Clapham Sect, the tracts were widely distributed to the poor. Continuing at monthly intervals over three years, the first series generated a total of 114 different tales, ballads, and catechisms under More’s overall direction. As many as two million were sold at subsidised prices by 1796. Typical prices were either a ha’penny, or a penny (roughly 50p to £1 in today’s terms). Large numbers were distributed free by the gentry in rural areas and shipped by missionaries to North America. Some of the tracts, such as Babay, the true story of a good Negro Woman, A True Account of a Pious Negro, and The Sorrows of Yamba (reprinted in vol. 4 of this edition), expressed abolitionist sentiments in conservative form. The passive victims of these tracts are more concerned for spiritual uplift than for deliverance from slavery. Abolition is paid lip-service even as its radical urgency is finessed or ignored.
