Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 October 2020
Your Reverence writes me that you would like to know whether the Negroes who are sent to your parts have been legally captured. To this I reply that I think your Reverence should have no scruples on this point, because this is a matter which has been questioned by the Board of Conscience in Lisbon, and all its members are learned and conscientious men. Nor did the bishops who were in Sao Thome, Cape Verde, and here in Loando—all learned and virtuous men—find fault with it. We have been here ourselves for forty years and there have been among us very learned Fathers…. [N]ever did they consider the trade as illicit. Therefore we and the Fathers of Brazil buy these slaves for our service without any scruple….
Brother Luis Brandaon to Father Sandoval, letter dated 12 March 1610 (Zinn 29)
So the question arises in my mind, Mary, do you really read the work of Black women? Did you ever read my words, or did you merely finger through them for quotations which you thought might valuably support an already conceived idea concerning some old and distorted connection between us? … Have you read my work, and the work of other Black women, for what it could give you? … We first met at the MLA panel, “The Transformation of Silence Into Language and Action.” This letter attempts to break a silence which I had imposed upon myself shortly before that date.
Audre Lorde, “An Open Letter to Mary Daly,” dated 6 May 1979 (68–70)