Career
In late 1784, at the age of sixteen, in order to get his life into some kind of order, Macaulay emigrated to Jamaica, where he worked as an assistant manager at a sugar plantation. He was at first deeply affected by the horrific violence of the slavery which surrounded him, but eventually became hardened to the plight of the slaves (by his own admission “callous and indifferent”). He was a good worker, had successfully moderated his drinking, and proved himself to be a model bookkeeper. He also, eventually, began to take an interest in the slaves and their welfare.
In 1789 Macaulay returned to Britain and secured a position in London. His sister Jean had married Thomas Babington of Rothley Temple, Leicestershire, a country gentleman and ardent evangelical, and soon after Macaulay went to stay with them he began to come under their influence. He underwent what he described as a conversion experience and soon came to know Babington’s associates, among whom were William Wilberforce and Henry Thornton.
Read more about this topic: Zachary Macaulay
Famous quotes containing the word career:
“John Brown’s career for the last six weeks of his life was meteor-like, flashing through the darkness in which we live. I know of nothing so miraculous in our history.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Each of the professions means a prejudice. The necessity for a career forces every one to take sides. We live in the age of the overworked, and the under-educated; the age in which people are so industrious that they become absolutely stupid.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
““Never hug and kiss your children! Mother love may make your children’s infancy unhappy and prevent them from pursuing a career or getting married!” That’s total hogwash, of course. But it shows on extreme example of what state-of-the-art “scientific” parenting was supposed to be in early twentieth-century America. After all, that was the heyday of efficiency experts, time-and-motion studies, and the like.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)