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CAUSE AND THE CONSEQUENCE

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ELECTION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN;

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^^arvard 8t. AK. E. Church, Cambridge, Sunday XlTenlttiE, ISfoT. 11,
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REV. GILBERT HAVEN.'

But as we were aUowed of God to'^e put in trust with the Ooapel, even so we speak ; notr-
i pleasing men, ]but God, which trieth. our hearts. 1 Thess. i, 4-

BOSTON:
J. M. HEWES, PRINTER, 81 CORNHILL.
Sold bi J. F. Masse, No. 6 Cobnhill.
 ^^

TE DEUM LAUDAMUS.

THE

CAUSE AND THE CONSEQUENCE

OF THE

ELECTION OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN;

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DELIVEEEn IN THE

Karvard St. SE. Xl. Cliarcli, Cambridge, Sanday I^Tenlnsr, Xot. 11, 1800,

REV. GILBERT HAVEN.

But as we were allowed of God to be put in trust with the Gospel, even so we speak ; not
as pleasing men, but God, which trieth our hearts. 1 Thess. i, 4.

BOSTON:
J. M. HEWES, PRINTER, 81 CORNHILL.
Sold bt J. P. Magee, No. 6 Cornhill.
I860.

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1860,
By John M. Hewes,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts.

TO IHE
HON. CHARLES SUMNER,
Who has spoken the bravest words for Liberty in the most perilous
places ; who has suffered in behalf of the Slave only less than those who
wear the martyr's crown ;^ who has come forth from that suffering with
the profoundest, because experimental, sympathy with the Oppressed,
with a more intense hatred of the Oppression, yet without any bitterness
of heart against the Oppressor ; who will stand forth in the future times
as the clearest-eyed, boldest-tongued, and purest-hearted Statesman of
the age, — these few words of Thanksgiving and Praise for the mani
festation of the Presence and Power of the Almighty Redeemer in this
greatest work of our time, are most respectfully dedicated.

The following discourse is published at the request of many
who heard it. Candor requires us to say, what those who read it
will naturally suppose, that it did not meet the approval of all the
audience. Those who disagreed with it when spoken, we trust will find
it less objectionable upon perusal and reflection. It would have been
issued earlier had not illness prevented. Events have transpired since
its delivery that might slightly modify some of the subordinate thoughts,
but its leading positions, we still believe, to be true. A word of thanks
giving may not be untimely, when so many men's hearts are failing
them through needless fear. The Spirit, through its servant, said unto
the churches, when a far greater darkness closed around a far greater
cause, "Rejoice, and again I say, rejoice." Shall not we then hail
with rejoicings the sun of Equal Liberty, now rising upon our land,
though tempestuous clouds suddenly rush across the glowing sky?
They are clouds without water — clouds without the lightnings of death.
With the brightness of its coming it will scatter all this darkness, calm
all this tempest, and fill the whole nation with the blessed radiance of
universal Liberty. The motto of our land, by God's goodness, shall
over be, as it has been, " Liberty and Union, now and forever, one
and inseparable."
Cambridge, Dec. 25, 1860.

DISCOUESE.

" I WILL sing unto the Loed, foe he hath triumphed gloriously.
The horse and his eider hath He thrown into the sea." Exodus xv, 1.
" Put promotion cometh neither from the East, nor from the West,
nor from the South.
" But God is judge : He putteth down one, and sbtteth up ano
ther." Ps. Ixxv, 6, 7.
" Jesus saith unto them, Did ye never read in th)b Sceiptuees, the
Stone M'Hich the builders rejected, the same is become the head of
THE COENEE : ThIS IS THE LoEd's DOING, AND IT IS MARVELLOUS IN OUE
EYES." Matt, xxi, 42.
One year ago last Sabbath evening, we assembled in this
house to meditate on the beginning of the end of American
Slavery. A fortnight before, a score of men had made a descent
on a National Arsenal, freed some slaves, been captured by the
soldiers of the Federal Government, their leader ¦ tried,, con
demned and sentenced to be hung. You well remember the
month that followed — far more exciting than the one through which
we have just passed. For thirty days, from -Calais to Galves
ton, only one name was on every lip, only one feeling in every
heart. You all remember the day of his death :
" Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright.
The bridal of the earth and sky."
You remember, far more clearly, the death itself, — more sweet,
more cool, more calm, raore bright, his soul's great bridal of earth
and heaven. No death of greater beauty adorns the pages of sec
ular history — no one sublimer is in the annals of Christian mar-

6
tyrdom. Socrates, with the hemlock at his lips, was not more
charming and childlike. Latimer, in the fire, was not raore
cheerful. Paul, among the lions, was not morc triumphant. It
was by far the greatest death-scene in American history, and will
shine forth purer' and nobler with every passing year, and pass
ing age.
A year has well nigh fled, and that life and death have been
reviewed by me in- such a fullness of immortal light as only the
greatest sorrow can pour upon the soul. In that great light, his
purpose and principles have only shone the purer, and I could
not enter on the glorious subject of our present meditation, with
out repeating, as my maturest convictions, the approval my heart
arid your hearts then spontaneously Uttered;
We come to-night not to sorrow over liberty enslaved afresh —
liberty, tried by the jury of the country, and without cause, with
out consideration, found guilty — -liberty under sentence of death
and on her way t6 the scaffold. No, thanks be to Ged, the be-
ginniflg of the end' of slavery gives lis gladder scenes in the
opening of the second act of its fast a,ccompli3hing drama.
The defeat at Bunker's Hill and the death of Warren— a lost
day and a lost leader, cast an im"measur&ble gloom, for a season,
in spite of some redeeming features, over the American heart.*
But the second great act, executed, like this, in but little less than
a year from the first, executed, like this, under tbe leadership of
the chosen captain of their hosts, by. which a proud and mighty
eneray, flushed with loijg success, and backed by the gigantic
powers of a great nation, without the -firing of a gun, evacuated
their most important post in the whole country, left it, never to
return, — ^the great deed by which Washington purged Boston of
its insolent and murderous foe, thrilled the whole nation with un
mitigated joy. So- this peaceful evacuation by the arrogant,
wealthy and long ruling-Slave Power of the most important post it
ever held or can hold, never to. return, has caused such a flood of
ecstacy, as never before filled the hearts of this people, since the
bells rang out the first declaration, and the bewildered multitudes

* Sec appendix A.

awoke to the realization of their existence as a united and free
nation. The perplexing and saddening features of the event of
last year do not mar this victory. No gallows tree stretches its
black arms athwart the golden sky, no dying groans, no stiffened
forms attend the triumphal shout and march. Shall we not, then,
come before His presence with thanksgivings whose right hand
and holy arm hath gotten Him the victory. For promotion cometh
neither from the east, npr from the west, nor from the south .
But God is judge : he putteth down one and setteth up another.
Not in the interest of the great party through whom He has
done this work, do I appear, but in the interest of that cause
which swells far, far beyond the power of that or any party to
embrace, — the redemption of millions upon millions of my fellow
men. In their behalf 1 raise the song of praise. That^ redemp
tion draweth nigh. Power is passing away from the side of the
oppressor. Power which belongeth unto God, is being pmployed
by Him to break this infampus yoke. Shall we not laud and
magnify his Name, in whose hand are the 'hearts pf the children
of men, that he has turned them as the rivers of water are turned,
and made them sweep upon, soon we trust to sweep away, this
rooted, and massy iniquity in their overflowing, swift rushing
flood ?
You may ask is it not a profanation pf the sanctuary to employ
it for rejoicings over mere political strifes ? This is very far from
an ordinary victory, and for its celebration we have the unani
mous voice of all ages and all religions.
Abraham praised God in a temple not made, with hands, for
the defeat of his enemies, and Melchizedek, the priest of. the
most high God, the type of Christ, poured upon his head the divine
benedictions. The victories of the Hebrew kings were celebrated
in the temple, and some, of the grandest psalms were written in
praise of national deliverances. The heathen, have followed this
natural sentiment, and in all ages and nations have hung the tro
phies of their triumphs in their temples ; have made their praises
to their gods rise above their shouts over their fallen foe. So the
Philistines rejoiced before Dagon^ when they Jiad captured Sam
son ; and, in a later day, when they gained, possessiori of the Ark

of God. The history of Delphi and other templed spots is but a
catalogue of such thanksgivings. The Christian world has, from
the first, obeyed the ancestral, human law. " Te, Deum laudamus"
" We praise thee. Oh God," has rung through the lofty arches of
great cathedrals, and against the dome of heaven, for more than
a thousand years, when the Lord had given their country deliver
ance in the day of battle.
We have, therefore, abundant precedent in the universal prac
tice of our race for entering these courts, to-night, with thanks
givings, and these walls with praise. Have we abundant reason ?
It may be said that these religious national rejoicings were be
cause of victories won on bloody fields, won over a foreign foe and
at the expense of human life. Is a mere periodical strife, peaceful
and bloodless, between brethren of the same family, for the honors
of civil life, is this to be placed beside the overthrow of the Egypt
ians, the destruction of the Assyrians, the redemption of Europe
at Waterloo, of Italy at Solferino ? Is it not straining a point to
thus elevate the mad whirl of quadrennial politics into a great
national, a great world battle, which marks an epoch in the history
of the race ?
These questions are very proper. For if it be but the ordinary
strife of ordinary politics, although the Church has the guardian
ship of these as she has of every other matter pertaining to human
duty, yet she might safely leave them to the general course of
her counsel and authority, without making their ephemeral vic
tories subject of especial exultation.
Let us then ask, as a needful preliminary to our songs of glad
ness and of hope, what was the subject of controversy in the late
conflict ?
The only subject set before the people was slavery ; its exten
sion and nationalization, or its relegation to the regions now black
ened with it, there to " writhe in pain,
And die amid its worshippers."
Four parties were professedly in the field, but only two com
batants, — only one question. In different parts of the land, the
two intermediate parties took different positions according to the

9
sentiment ruling there. In the South they contended against the
domineering passion for the national supremacy of Slavery. In
the North they fought with equal zeal against its ruling passion,
the national supremacy of Liberty. Their bands flew across the
field, now striking at the haughty slave power, and now, at the
iron legions of Freedom.
Behind them advanced steadily the great hosts with their ban
ners flying, each glowing with its one word. On the one side the
gorgeous black flag — upon it, lurid flames shooting forth that word
infernal, Slavery. On the other, the lustrous white flag, "so as no
fuller on earth can whiten," with the logos celestial, Liberty, flash
ing from its radiant folds. Marching beneath them, each party
felt, instinctively, immeasurably felt, that the issue involved the
most vital questions ever submitted to this nation ; and, that the
result was sure to be disastrous to freedom, if defeated, fatal to
slavery, if it should go down in the battle.
No other question was debated by the leading advocates of all
parties. One of the candidates for the Presidency, and one of
the ablest men in the country, traversed its length and breadth,
making many addresses ; and the burden of every one was
Slavery. True he endeavored to exclude it from the canvass, but
he could not exclude it from his own speeches. It rounded every
sentence, pointed every line. And it was not a little remarkable
that so sagacious a statesman should not have perceived, that
what had filled all his public life, good and evil, for a decade
of years, was not to be banished from the general mind, nor set
tled in the national councils, except by a fair fight on the appoint
ed field.
The other party, though attempting to banish it from their
platform, showed the impossibility of the attempt in its very
phraseology. For its two chief words, " Constitution and Union,"
proved that they felt or fancied these to be endangered by the
struggle with slavery. Its worthy appendix, " the enforcement
of the laws," was aimed solely at the execution of the most
unchristian and inhuman act that ever issued from a Christian
legislature. If it were not so, I hope that other law for
the suppression of the sale of intoxicating liquors, which especially
2

10
needs enforcement in this section, will be executed by this locally
large and influential party. They will find enough who disagree
with them as to the duty of enforcing the Fugitive Slave Act, who
will gladly aid them in executing the most excellent of Mas
sachusetts laws in her rum-ridden metropolis.
From the unwiUing, but universal confession of neutrals, there
fore, 1X0 less than from the declarations of real opponents, do we
sefe clearly the field of conflict. The real weapons of the real fight
ers were all drawn from one armory, all waged in one battle.
The only speaker that advocated the Southern party in this region
made the strongest defence of human slavery ever made in Mas
sachusetts. There was an honest boldness that was refreshing
to witness, in inviting Mr. Yancey to give a pro-slavery speech in
Faneuil Hall — a boldness no party would have been equal to in
any previous campaign. The invitation was not accepted by a
timid man. No abler, no bolder speech was ever made in Boston
than Mr. Yancey's, viewed as a eulogy on a system abhorrent in
the utmost degree to almost every one of his audience. As he
was here, so were his associates every where on slave soil. As
he was here, so would the advocates of freedom have been, had
they been allowed to speak in Richmond, Charleston, Mobile or
New Orleans. So Tvere they on their native heather, the broad
free soil of the North.
Not a syllable was breathed against the candidate of slavery,
except his devotion to that system ; not a syllable against the
victorious leader of the hosts of Freedom, except his opposition
to it. " It is the cause," then, " it is the cause, my friends,"'
that has organized, inspired, waged and won this national battie.
It is the cause, too, that commands me to speak to-night, to speak
in my ofiScial capacity, as an amdassador of Jesus Christ, upon
one of the especial objects of my mission-— the freedotn, equality
and fraternity of the human race. ,
Some may yet complain that we drag the holy vestments of
the altar in this mire of social strife. Do you remember how Phin
ehas, the priest of the Most High God, possibly while arrayed in
most sacred robes, and, in his hand, the sacrificial knife consecra
ted exclusively to the service of the altar, rushed in amon"' the

11
sinning Israelites and their idolatrous associates, slaying heathen
and Hebrew in the midst of their profane abominations ? And
do you remember how that Most High God said to Moses, " Phin
ehas, the son of Eleazer, the son of Aaron, the priest, hath turned
my wrath away from the children of Israel, while he was zealous
for my sake among them, that I consumed not the children of
Israel in my jealousy. Wherefore say. Behold I give unto him
my covenant of peace : And he shall have it and his seed after
him, even the covenant of an everlasting priesthood : because he
was zealous for his God and made an atonement for the children
of Israel." Was it a greater deed for this minister to stay the
plague of voluntary passion, than for us to seek to stay that plague
which makes pure and pious men and women the victims of every
conceivable lust that power, avarice or passion breeds ?
If Christ showed that the zeal of the house of the Lord had
eaten him up, by scourging from the temple^ the seat of civil as
well as religious authority, those that sold doves, shall we say his
servants are not his followers, when they seek to scourge from
our temple pf civil and religious liberty those that sell men ?
The temple of our national life has become defiled. Woe to
that priest who is dumb before the defilers ! In Christ's day
some of them shared in the business that profaned his house. In
our day some pf them share in the honors and profits of this far
greater profanation. Let us obey the example he has set us, —
not th6 decrees pf timid, time-serving, wicked men.
But this defence is unnecessary before this congregation. The
contest as to the rights and duties of the ministry to engage in
this work has long heen settled in this region. Here and there, the
rare exceptions requisite to prove a rule rise before us, denying
the privileges of humanity to those who are set to apply to the
hearts of men all the laws of the Divine Author of humanity. Not
so with the multitudes. Slavery is to them an object not only of
civil, but of religious detestation. Its defeat, on any field, is a cause
of religious thanksgiving. Its defeat on the field where it has just
fallen, — the field it has ruled the longest and the ablest, where its
chief seat is by choice, and fey necessity if it retain any seat in the
land, its overthrow and its expulsion from the throne of the na-

12
tional government, its flight to its native lair, and the soon coming
fight there for bare existence, these are subjects of the most
devout, the most rapturous praise. " Not unto us, 0 Lord, not
unto us, but unto thy name give glory, for thy mercy and thy
truth's sake."
Let us, then, gratefully meditate on the late victory, consider
ing its cause and its consequence.
I. Its Cause. Why has Freedom triumphed f
For two chief reasons among a multitude of lesser ones ; First,
the growth of conscience as to the nature and effects of slavery ;
and, Second, the growth of fear as to its political power and
prospects. The first and profoundest cause is the awakening of the con
science of the nation as to the dreadful character and workings
of slavery.
There must always be two periods, at least, of attack upon any
organized iniquity before the tide of moral sentiment deluges and
drowns it forever. The first awakening is moderately efficient,
but the mighty sin is too strong for complete overthrow. The be
sieging hosts get weary and slumber on their arms. The enemy
sallies forth and triumphs over them. They dwell in captivity to
the evil they rose against. Again the conscience grows, again
liie vice is attacked, and in the new assault is left weaker than
befote, perhaps completely destroyed ; if not, the victorioul right
yields anew to the slumber of sloth and sin ; is chained and ruled
afresh, again bursts its bands and sweeps on irresistibly to victory.
Thus, by tidal waves of flux and reflux, the huge mountain of sin
is finally buried beneath the deep, aboundmg ocean of truth.
So the Jews moved forward, from Joshua to David, in the sub
jugation of Canaan. So Christianity has marched, is marching
forward in the subjugation of the world. So Grecian idolatry, in
a hand to hand fight with early Christianity, fell and rose, fell and
rose, weaker at each resurrection, till three hundred years after
its first defeat, that form, eminent and potent for more than a thou
sand years, fell, never to rise again. So Roman slavery stag
gered and tumbled before the sharp blows of the same Apostolic

13
Christianity, — sprang to its feet with the ferocity and strength of a
wounded lion and rent its enemies in pieces ; again felt the shafts,
again reeled and fell, again rose and raged, till, after half a mil
lennium, the golden rule of the Saviour and the golden command
of his apostle to Christian masters, to give their servants that
which was just and equal, were finally obeyed, and throughout
Christian Europe, property in man passed into the execrable list,
abjured and abominated by every person.
The black race, in consequence of its seclusion and degrada
tion, was separated almost entirely from this influence. True,
Africa had been honored with the earliest, and, in many respects,
the ablest of Christian schools. Her sons had worn the conse
crated mitre, and sat in equal authority with the Bishops of Rome
and Jerusalem in Episcopal Councils. But the ravages of the
Vandals nipped this budding civihzation, and Mussulman fanati
cism perpetuated the work northern Paganism had achieved.
Christian Europe, hemmed in by Mohammedanism on the south
and south-east, and by the wildest heathenism on the north and
north-east, without extensive commerce and without mechanic
arts, itself the child of northern idolatry, baptized with the child
ish Christianity of Rome, grew, by slow and unequal steps, to a
true manhood in Christ. So far had she retrograded from her
earliest faith in the last two centuries, that traffic in human flesh
was again found among her lawful commerce. And though she
never fell back so far as to acknowledge the right of property in
the white and Christian man, she did finally recognize the idea of
ownership in the African race.
It was reserved for this land to inaugurate the work of univer
sal emancipation. That work began with the beginning of our
history, and has risen and fallen, with mingled success and failure,
to the victory of this hour. Massachusetts first refused to receive
a cargo of slaves at the same time that Virginia first welcomed
them. The principles involved in those two deeds have been in
conflict, violent or latent, throughout our whole history.
The fundamental law, on which universal personal freedom must
stand, the law of perfect equality before God, has long been set
tled here, has never yet been acknowledged elsewhere in the

14
world. America was settled by the flower of Protestantism before
it had fallen into the sear and yellow leaf pf formalism, or the
thrice dead infidelity which covered all Europe, Protestant and
Catholic, in the last century, with thorns and briars fit only for
cursing. Our fathers, the Pilgrims and Puritans of Massachusetts, the
Baptists of Rhode Island, the Quakers and Lutherans of Pennsyl
vania, the Episcopalians pf Virginia, the Catholics of Maryland,
and the Huguenots of Carolina, were all refugees from religious
persecution. Every State was settled or largely populated by
sufferers for conscience sake. And after a few ineffectual strug
gles to employ the same cramps and fetters upon others that had
been visited upon themselves, they arose, one after another, to
the true apprehension of the rights of conscience, and Puritan
and Episcopalian, Baptist and Pedobaptist, Quaker, and Lutheran,
Huguenot and Catholic, came to that broad table land of univer
sal freedom to the religious sentiment which is still the most won
derful characteristic of this nation.
So: thoroughly had this doctrine filled the air of common life,
long before the. formation of our confederacy, that only the brief
est and most incidental reference to the ¦\vhole subject is found in
our Constitution. I have heard a scholarly'Englishman complain
of it for this very defect — a defect like that found in the Bible,
where proofs of the existence of God, and the obligations of Re
ligion are never given, its every line assuming these as accredited,
universal truths.
So did our fathers settle the other great question — the greatest
that affects our human relations— ^the absolute right of every man
tp himself. Advancing, not ascending, on the lofty table land of
the equality of every man before God, they stood upon that first of
human truths — the equality of every man before his fellows.
While Europe bowed down to certain families and individuals as
royal and sovereign by right divine, and, as a natural consequence,
esteemed the other extreme of society, whether peasants or slaves,
as void of all rights which the crouchers were bound to respect,
the American people, coming together, through their representa
tives, themselves the nominal holders of slaves, unanimously, un-

15
hesitatingly, enthusiastically declared that " All men are created
free and equal." Such a declaration by the founders of a nation
the world had never heard before.
Their first struggle was to establish their own equality before
King, and Nobles, and Parhament, and a haughty people. They
must prove the fallacy of the divine right of kings on the battle
field. Only one great inspiration can possess at a time, a man
or a people. This broad platform must rest on the head of king
and slaveholder, but it must be planted on that of the king first, as
the most imminent and dangerous foe. Hence the revolutionary
struggle and victory.
When they had emerged from that conflict — when George
the Third saluted George Washington, and, through him, the
American people, as his perfect equal, then came a second duty —
to preserve this equality among themselves. How perilous was
their state you can faintly conceive, by seeing how all classes have
just been swept into the current of an unnatural reverence for the
youthful heir of that throne.
These patriots were born royalists. A vast proportion of the
people were, in feeling and theory, royalists. Every city was full
of wealth and fashion thus devoted. If England's royalty and
nobility were expelled, might not America substitute one df her
own ? Italy has just proved the passion of a people for a king.
Mazzini and Garibaldi had to yield to Victor Emariiiel, republic
anism to royalty. So might it have been here. Our fathers
saved us by self-denial. It was a greater work to dehver them
selves from themselves than from England. " Greater is he that
ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city."
Every member of that Constitutional Convention could have had
an American title of nobility. Lands for the support of that title
were more abundant than WiUiam's barons found them in Eng
land in the eleventh century. The leaders of the people, Wash
ington, Hamilton, Adams, and Jefferson, would have been of the
blood royal or next the throne. They saw the peril. They must
meet it. They did. They especially guarded against inequality
of rank, forbad the receipt of titles from foreign courts, and steered
clear of the currents that might s-vf eep them into that channel-^a

16
senate without pay or for life, an executive for life or for a long
term of years. 2ind they eonsumated their precautions by one of
their earliest acts of legislation — forbidding the increase of the
Society of the Cincinnati, or even its continuance among the sons
of the original members, as this society, being composed of the
ofiicers of the Revolution, might, through the fascination of the
military spirit, endanger their primal and most vital idea — equality,
liberty. As we have said, only one fever can rage at a time, only one
great duty be done at once. Therefore, while their sympathies
went out for the slave population, while their conscience told them
they should be equally faithful and honest to these as to them
selves, their exhausting labors were in another direction. They
rested from their labors, fondly hoping their chUdren would take
up and apply their great principles to this oppressed people.
Of the chief revolutionary patriots, Franklin alone was an avow
ed abolitionist. Jefferson wrote against slavery, or rather wrote
reflections upon it, but never worked vigorously for its extinction.
Franklin cast his influence on that side, probably, more because
he dwelt among the liberty-loving Quakers than from an inherent
passion of his own. Washington disliked it, but when urged by
Lafayette to make the experiment of emancipating and hiring his
negroes, he declines on account of the embarrassed state of his
property, and yet he died shortly after, leaving an estate estimated
at half a miUion of doUars, which is more than a mUlion at the
present valuation of money.
The fact must be stated that whUe faithful to one half of their
theory, they were practicaUy indifferent to the other. While
abolishing aU titular distinctions and equaUzing aU the white in
habitants, they failed to abolish the title of slaveholder, and to give
their colored brethren that which was just and equal.
The battle on this field exhausted aU their energies. To keep
this liberty from licentiousness, this equality from familiarity, to
preserve an aristocracy, to sustain democracy against aristocracy,
to secure state rights, to maintain the federal unity and strength,
on these important fields the war raged, and the servant of ser
vants was unnoticed in his servitude among the great questions of

17
social and political equaUty that so violently agitated the govern
ing classes.
This work was perhaps as much "as one age could do. It was
certainly more than any one age had previously done. The men
who achieved it were more than thirty years in accomplishing it.
Thomas Jefferson wrought wondrously for the rights of man, from
1776 to 1809 — thirty-three years of most remarkable service in. a
most remarkable cause. He was then past sixty — an old man,
weary with the cares of State — ^not fit in vigor or vehemence for
the great work of emancipation. Faihng to keep progressive he
slid ba'ckwards, and dishonored his gray hairs by apologizing for
slavery and defending the Missouri compromise. ' ¦
The generation that succeeded them, as great men's sons are
apt to be, were very;. poor imitators of their illustrious fathers.
Most trees bear only biennially. Most generations are under a
simUar law. A great calm follows a great storm. ' The children
of these revolutionary parents were feeble in principle, low in
moral tone. They were tired of great ideas and ^great deeds.
The overstrained nature sprang back to the narrower range which
men naturally prefer. The leading men of that age, men who
have just left us, were far below their fathers in greatness of
nature, and will be incalculably beneath them in greatness of fame.
Clay, Calhoun, Adaras, Webster and Jackson, its five representa
tive men, present to the historian no such lofty traits of character
or service as shine in the names of five representatives of the
preceding era, Washington, Adaras^ Jefferson, Hamilton and
Franklin. John Quincy Adams alone of his peers held forth the light that
glowed in his youth. But not he, tiU he had descended from the
presidental throne into the vale of age and comparative pohtical
obscurity. Hardly a word of his can be quoted before his seven
tieth year, that has the ringing sound of liberty. How different
from the young John Adams in the mass meetings of Boston, the
provincial Congress and Independence Hall. Fortunate was he
that those last few years and that congressional opportunity were
given him.
It was an era of the deadening of the conscience, on the sub-
3

18
ject of freedom. Church and State alike feU into the slumber.
Political and religious comproraises becarae the order of the day.
The sentiment of the fathers was against slavery. But sentiment
can do nothing against sin. And so the sons came to endure, to
pity, to embrace the unclean thing, and from Calhoun to Webster,
fell down and worshipped the abominable idol their pious fathers
had neglected to destroy.
" New times demand ngw measures and new men."
The new times had arrived. New men, and their new measures
were not wanting. The third generation appears on the stage of
action. The grandsires find their likeness in their grand-chUdren,
not their chUdren. Thirty years passed from the triumph of
Jefferson to that of Jackson, the representatives of the ideas of
their generations. Thirty years have passed from the triumph
of Jackson to that of the Anti-Slavery sentiment, not in the per
son of its recognized exponent, but still in the- strength of its
mighty feeling and purpose. This thirty'years covers the era of
this agitation, covers the adult life of its promoters. You will
find on the' Liberator of this year, "Volume XXX : " and this
sheet- has the honor of initiating the movement in this nation.
The conscience was aroused very slowly. The deadly slumber
was pleasant. Churches, societies, parties, every body disliked
to be disturbed. But the young men sympathized with young Mr.
Garrison and his young idea. Young Mr. Seward then emerging
into public life, felt the throbbings of the new inspiration. Young
Mr. Phillips and Mr. Sumner, then students at Harvard or on
their way thither ; the youthful Tappan, and Leavitt, and Lovejoy,
and Giddings, and Gerritt Sraith, caught the flarae in their fresh
and sympathetic hearts, and commenced kindling it in the breasts
of others. Dr. Channing and John Quincy Adams were almost
the only men of accomplished fame that endorsed the enterprise,
and they did not publicly cooperate with its youthful managers.
Soon bitter conflicts sprang up in the breasts of these young
philanthropists. The fresh armed men began to bite and devour
one another, and were well nigh consumed one of another. Yet
stUl the great inspiration moved on, through them, in spite of

19
them. New measures were required by the progress of the
sentiment. The conscience growing, demanded a chance to ex
press itself at the baUot box. This was resisted by Mr. Garrison.
He did raore than this. Led by his love of free speech, he
permitted some ©f his leading, associates to burden the " animosus
infans" -with gross infldelities and social absurdities. But its
intense life threw off all these deformities. Would that, in his
sphere of effort, and to the measure of his large abilities and
influence, he had kept this Uberty from becoming licentiousness.
Would that he, like Wilberforce, had kept his heart sweet with
prayer and piety through the whole of. this great war. Wiser
minds, not larger hearts, took the reins ; or, rather, on different
parts of the same field, with different weapons, they fought the
common foe.
This conscience has thus steadily increased untU this hour.
The vast majority of the men of to-day have grown up under its
power ; for the mass of men a,re under forty-five years. The im
pressible youth of fifteen, who drank of this new wine when it was
first pressed from the grapes of a fresh experience, is to-day the
governor elect of your coraraonwealth. The poor youth of twenty,
toiling in the solitude of western rivers and forests, learning to
abhor slavery because of its conterapt for honorable industry, is
to-day the civil leader .of the cause and country.
Thus has the conscience which moved our grandsires to the
great work of personal liberation, moved us towards the completion
of their work, in the liberation of more persons than their valor
saved, from a bondage infinitely worse than that which pressed
them down.
But, secondly, fears created by the rapid march of the slave
power have aided in this work. The growth of this power has
been a necessary compleraent of the corresponding growth of the
abolition sentiment. The Gospel is a savor of life unto Ufe and of
death unto death. Conscience is one and the same in every
man. But conscience trampled upon, is sure to revenge itself by
allowing the passions that expel it from its seat to assume a
diabolic sovereignty. The Southern mind felt as keenly as the
Northern that slavery was a sin. There was but one testimony

20
from the whole land in our «arly history, and even as late as the
beginning of this agitation. But when the conscience began to ^
be heard saying, plearly,; " extirpate this evU. Let my op
pressed go free and break every yoke," — self interest said " Nay,
I shaU impoverish myself by so- doing. My money is invested in
slaves.. My habits, and tastes are educated i.n slavery. My
heart incluies to it." ^So they j-esisted the Spirit of Goql. They
trampled under foot the national life-principle. They counted the
revolutionary blood shed for thejn an unholy thing. ' They turned
and rent those who cast these pearls at their feet, and who called
upon them to adorn their brpws with their lustye.
They began to defend the eystem through the press, in the
forum, on the bench, from the pulpit. They sought to extend it.
They sought to open the accursed trade which should populate
their wUdernesses with the , barbaric merchandise. They en
throned themselves in the national legislature, in the presidental
chair, in the supreme court. They trod out freedom of the press,
freedom of speech, almost freedom of thought, in all the slave
States. They were on the point of nationalizing slavery in the
territories, in every free State. Their chUdren, fifty years hence,
will not beUeve their fathers zealously advocated practices so
abhorrent to human nature.
There was no real change in the Southern conscience. That
still-told them "You are verily guUty concerning your brother."
" Slavery is the sum of aU villanies." I never saw a slaveholder who
did not, when he spoke his real sentiraents, raake this confession.
A gentleman who long lived in Alabama told me he had often
heard slaveholders, worth a raillion of this property, say, " The
slaves have just as rauch right to their freedom, as I, to mine."
It was this conscience that raade the whole South shake with
indisguisable terror, when they heard that hero-martyr saying to
their bondmen " You are as free as I or your master. Here is
a weapon to defend yourself if they attempt to enslave you.
Here is one who will aid you in using tbat weapon, if they dare
to attack you." Their audacious course consummated its malig
nity in the murder of that man whom every one of them knew was
in the right and doing right. For they saw, however blind we

21
might be, that hewas of the blood 'royal of mankind, most of
whom rule the race from the scaffold. They felt that he was
proving in this deed, his lineal descent from the patriotic but
defeated Gracchii, and Demosthenes, and Wallace, and Harapden,
and Vane, and RusseU. But- time would fail me to raention the
grand list of martyrs for liberty into whose front ranks they saw
him enter, who all died in the faith, not inheriting the pro-
inises. - This God-defying march of the hosts of Satan upon the sacred
institutions, the more sacred inspirations of the land, helped to
stimulate the already quickening conscience of the North. The
heaviest eyes began to open — the duUest natures to stir. Every
one whose heart throbbed with any of the life of their fathers, of
their fathers' God, felt that the evil must be rebuked, must be
repressed, must be extirpated, so far as any constitutional or
moral power could do it. So the Church and the State have
moved together, — here, slowly and cautiously, there boldly and
manfully, every where motion, every where life, until the mighty
work is wrought which puts our governraent, openly and entirely,
on the side of Freedom.
This then is the cause, this alone — the Spirit of God moving on
the hearts of the children of men. " This is the Lord's doing,
and it is marvellous in our eyes." " Not unto us, 0 Lord, not
unto us, but unto Thy name give glory." The Lord hath
triumphed gloriously. " The horse and his rider," the Northern
political slave and his Southern political master, " hath He cast
into the sea."
II. Let us now consider the consequence of this victory, which
is one in fact,' though threefold inform.
First. It will suppress all efforts to extend slavery. The
battle was waged at this point. Here, too, was it won. For the
first tirae in all this long conflict the hostUe parties agreed as to
the object in dispute. Every previous Deraocratic Convention
shut off the real issue frora the people. The Whig and Araerican
parties, when alive, were equally careful. Tariff, banks, the
Catholic question, retrenchment and reform, aU these have

22
turned away the gaze of the masses from their real danger and
duty. Mr. Douglas supposed that what had been, would stiU be,
and therefore atterapted to get up a war-cry that should raean
nothing, while under its delusion', the people should again put in pow
er their haughty tyrant. But the honesty of the slave power swept
away this subterfuge. They boldly placed at the head of their col^
umns the universal supreraacy of slavery. The free sentiraent
hailed the conflict. The deadly embrace is passed, and slavery
lies prone upon the field. A tyrant once slain is slain forever.
Error can never survive its Waterloo. Freedom had often faUen,
but it rose ever the more beautiful and strong from its momentary
defeat. Slavery has fallen, never to rise again defiant, success
ful. It will rule in New York and Boston before it ever rules
again at Washington. It ruled there first only by our consent.
We must rehabilitate it at home before we allow it to return
thither. This absolute and unquestioned, gain — the point, the centre of
the fight is alraost incalculable. Some speak slightingly of it and
say nothing is done. The Fugitive Slave act is recognized by
President Lincoln as constitutional. He wiU favor the admis
sion of slave states if they come constitutionally to the door of
the nation. These are not agreeable sights. Yet, consider how
unlikely they are to occur. What slave state will seek admis
sion to an Anti-Slavery confederacy ? As for the fugitive from
slavery, unless vital raodifications are raade in the present law,
the people will take care that he is not returned. Can one here
be seized, and sentenced to bondage again as unrighteously as An
thony Burns was, and pass down State street in broad daylight,
fettered by a squad of foreign mercenaries, when more than a hun
dred thousand of the citizens of Massachusetts have put the most
eloquent defender of the Personal Liberty bUl in the chair of
State ?
The accursed oceanic slave trade will forever cease. New
York will be relieved from the miserable honor of sending out
these vessels, — Savannah and Charleston, the more miserable
honor of receiving their cargoes. Africa and Cuba will be gird
led with a moving wall of fire through which but few of the dread-

23
ful craft can pass. If nothing more were done than is assuredly
done, it is wonderful, it is worthy of unbounded thanksgivings.
But, secondly, we have done stiU more. We have set our
selves right before the world. We shall cast our influence, as a
great nation, on the side of universal liberty. For years we have
been a by-^word and a hissing among the nations. Not a word
for freedom could escape the Ups of our representatives abroad,
for they were bound, hand and foot, mouth and tongue, with the
graveclothes of this body of death. Our influence has been
against freedom every where, in every man. The conscience of
the slaveholder, the conscience of the tyrants of France ahd Aus
tria and Rome, were stifled in the deadly air which our govern
ment exhaled. AU this is changed. America will stand forth in
the glory of her earlier, better days ; — in a glory greater than
that, for we now appear as the upholder of the rights of every
man, of every hue and condition. Italians contend for the rights
of Italians, Hungarians for Hungarians, Englishraen for English
men ; we, alone, for the black race, the weakest and least favored
of the children of Adam. Napoleon boasted that he went to war for
an idea. We fought for vastly more, — the foundation principle of
humanity, — the oneness in blood and destiny of the huraan race.
This influence is worth every thing. It is irrepressible, it is
unavoidable. The acts and words of the Adrainistration wUl be
most careful and moderate, but this power it cannot repress. It
is an Anti-Slavery Government. It was created because it was
anti-slavery. That word assures us that a new life is breathed
into the soul of the nation. It wiU thrill with its enthusiasm
every section of the land, every corner of the globe. Distracted
Mexico will now turn entreating eyes upon us, certain to see no
wolfish leer in our gaze, hungering to reduce her citizens to slaves.
The South American Republics wiU sit at our feet, and follow pur
footsteps in the upward march to perfect freedom. Hayti will
stand at our capitol among the great nations, its representative
sitting with those of England and France, in the seats of ambas
sadorial dignity and equality. Italy and France, Germany and
Eno-land, will, as never before, admire and imitate the raistress of

24
nations, sitting in the glory of universal Uberty onthe highest seat
of earthly authority.
What is better than aU, the sweet, sumraer morning air of free
dom will once more steal over the hot and arid plains of southern
despotism. Blowing from the whole north, through Washington,
through the Executive mansion, it will nerve with vigor many a
soul now paralyzed with fear. The minister of Christ, who 'has
there, for these many years, denied his Master, wUl weep bitterly,
and speak earnestly against the fearful crime that has so long
cursed' the church and his own soul. Literature will feel it.
Southern Whittiers will arise, who shall make her hills and glades
echo with their trumpet blasts of denunciation, their trumpet calls
to the conflict and the victory. Mrs. Stowes will spring from
their own soil, who will portray the evils and wrongs of their cher
ished " institution,", the duty and blessedness of universal eman
cipation, in colors that shall outshine their marvellous prototype,
because they wiU ba drawn from personal experiences, and fiUed
with the enthusiasm that only such experiences can inspire. The
whole people will be made alive with the mighty wind, blowing
from the hills of God over their fields of dry bones, and they shall
stand upon their feet, an exceeding great army, for freedom.
What is already seen on the northern border of the black abyss
will be seen every where. St. Louis gives almost ten thousand
votes for liberty, as many as Boston, and, better than Boston,
with these votes sends a bold and earnest abolitionist to the
national councils. Baltiraore gives over a thousand votes for
freedom, — as many as the whole State of Massachusetts gave
twenty years ago. That thousand has become a hundred thou
sand here in a score of years. It wiU become thrice that there,
ere half that time has passed. In every southern city, even
Charleston, the worst, will be found representatives of an anti-
slavery government. In every State, papers will be advocating
its principles ; in every heart the Spirit of God, which is liberty,
wiU assert its claims, acknowledged, be obeyed. And that ser
pent, in whose folds a great multitude of Laococins are writhing
in unspeakable agony, " that great serpent, which is the Devil
and Satan," shall be bound, shall be hurled into the bottomless

25
pit, shall disappear from this first and best of lands, and, with it,
from the earth, forever.
For, lastly, this glorious victory assures the speedy abolition of
slavery. I say, speedy, not with a few months, or a Presidential
term in view, but with only a few years, in comparison with its
long life and wide dominion.
The knell of slavery was struck last year in the heroic deed,
and more heroic death of John Brown. He first shook the totter
ing Bastile to its foundations. It had been riddled, it had been
undermined, but it had not rocked on its base tiU he put his
hand upon it. It reeled to and fro like a slave ship in a storm,
and well nigh foundered then. I have frequently mentioned
this event with words of approval, such as but few, probably, in
this audience will re-echo. It is proper, therefore, that I should
pause and give a brief reason for my opinions. Our satirical
neighbor says the mUlenuiura is near at hand,
" When preachers tell us all they think."
I have not shunned to declare to you the whole counsel of God
on the highest of our duties. I shall not play the hypocrite now.
Allowing the largest liberty of opinion to others, I claim equal
liberty for myself. I know how the tide of misconception and
condemnation stUl sets against Capt. Brown. I know that the
Tribune and Independent, — anti-slavery journals of deserved in
fluence, — stiU speak of his attempt as a " raid," a term of dis
paragement, if not of reproach. I know Mr. Seward said he was
"justly hung." I know that many cry out with horror atthe
bare idea of putting weapons in the hands of the slaves, to main
tain their freedora, and say, that he that apologizes for such an act
defiles his sacerdotal garraents and is become a corapanion with
murderers. But, on the other hand, I see how Victor Hugo and the other
great and pure patriots of Europe can find no words to express
their admiration of the deed and its doer. Struggling in chains
of despotism at home, they know how to appreciate the intense
humanity of 'one, who strove not to save himself, but others from a
far worse tyranny than crushes them down. I see the strong
4

26
arm of Massachusetts wielding a sword, whUe she pronounces the
sentence first uttered by the slaughtered patriot, Algernon Sydney,
which might have been properly emblazoned, with Virginia's
motto, on John Brown's banners, " Unse petit placidam sub liber
tate quietem," — She seeks, with the sword, serene quiet under
liberty. I see Hayti, the only really independent and enterpris
ing African State, hailing the raan with a spontaneous, reverence
and admiration, and out of her poverty sending to his famUy
thousands of dollars, as a token of her gratitude.
I find nothing in human nature, human history, or the Word of
God that rebukes this sentiment. The gospel of Peace does npt
always require of its disciples non-resistance to every forra of re
volting oppression, but sometimes demands of them a stern resist
ance even " unto blood, striving against sin."
The Saviour himself, among his last injunctions, commands those
of his disciples who had no sword, to sell their tunic, or chief
garment, and buy one ; — thereby clearly teaching us, that the
clothing needful for the protection of our bodies is not to be
placed beside the means of defending our liberties and our lives.
This enterprise, as we understand it, sought to put the sword in
the hands of the slave, only that he might defend his God-given
freedom against his enslavers. So deep and universal is the con
viction of this right, that had the people whom he strove to de
liver been of our own race, or even of any race but the African,
whom we hold in such inhuman contempt, there would have been
no more objection to the rightfulness of the enterprise, than there
was to the many unsuccessful attempts of our fathers to release
their brethren from the far less terrible slavery, in which they
were held by the Corsairs df Algiers.
In the light of these facts and principles, I find no condem
nation for this man or his deed. In the Ught of its influence on
the hideous wrong it assailed, I see much in it to approve. I
cannot but conclude, therefore, that the words of censure so rife
at present are the offspring of long indulged prejudice, or when
uttered by some of our wise leaders, have been prompted either
by an unwise desire to commend the anti-slavery chalice to the
Ups of slaveholders, by removing some of the bitter but essential

27
ingredients that strengthen the potion, or else by the temptations
of ambition, — " That last infirmity of noble minds."
In either case they wiU yet be regretted more than any other
of their utterances.
If this be called fanaticism I am content to bear the imputation.
I am not alone in this state, however it raay be elsewhere, if the
late election truly expresses the sentiment of the people. The
election to the governorship, by the largest vote any candidate
ever received, of the man, who, more than aU others, labored to
save him from that "just" death, who publicly endorsed his
character, if not the abstract rightfulness of the attempt, such an
elevation of his best friend to our best office, is a strong evidence
that our common sense and comraon huraanity are getting the
better of our fears and prejudices. The hated Mordecai already
descends, here, from the gallows of public condemnation on which
the Haman of a subtle pro-slaveryism had hung hira, and rides
through our streets in the royal apparel of executive sovereignty,
as the man whom the people delighteth to honor. As if to show
that this remarkable act of the people of Massachusetts was not
the blind following of bUnd political leaders, but a sUent yet real
voice of approval, her favorite lyric poet coraes forth and places a
garland of exquisite beauty and perfume on the grave of the hero.
Under the influence of his religious training, the Quaker Whittier
cast upon his coffin a hastily gathered wreath of bitter herbs.
But true also to the fundamental principles of his faith, through
the influences of the events and reflections of the past year, he has
discovered the " Inner Light" of superior truth, and with char
acteristic frankness, has published the revelations of that Light.
A late poem, written on the liberation of Italy, by its own confes
sion, covers the whole ground of the present controversy. The
laurel which he places on Garibaldi's brow, he hangs alike on John
B.rown's tomb. Hear the sentiment of almost every Christian in
these true and tender and solemn words : —
" I dreamed of Freedom slowly gained
By Martyr meekness, patience, faith.

28
And lo ! an athlete grimly stained,
With corded muscles battle-strained.
Shouting it from the field of death !
******
I know the pent fire heaves the crust,.
That sultry skies the bolt will form
To smite them clear ; that nature must
The balance of her powers adjust.
Though with the earthquake, and the storm.
And who am I, whose prayers would stay
The solemn recompense of time.
And lengthen Slavery's evil day
That outraged Justice may not lay
Its haud upou the sword of crime !
God reigns, and let the earth rejoice !
I bow before His sterner plan.
Dumb are the organs of my choice ;
He speaks in battle's stormy voice.
His praise is in the -wrath of man !"
If the violent act of one man thus paralyzed this iniquity, much
more wUl the peaceful act of two miUions tend to its annihilation.
Our righteous and peaceful course wiU not be instantly answered
in a simUar spirit. It may at first, it undoubtedly will, intensify
the rage that already burns in their breasts, seven-fold hotter
than it did aforetime. This rage and fear wUl gnash upon us
with its teeth, will seek to frighten us, by financial crises and
threats of secession, into submission. Let us not be alarraed.
Let but Wall street look on and hold on, calm and cool, as Mene-
laus did when Proteus sought to elude him by assuming terrific
shapes and making beastly noises, and the monster now as then,
wiU become tame and humble. Our greatest danger is in the
cowardice of the moneyed power. The Church is getting ready to
do her part. Politics is doing hers, and now the third of our social
forces must do hers. If she fails, if she whines and grows paUid
and begs her dear slaveholding brethren to desist, and promises
northern repentance and its meet works, she will only encourage
them in their course. She can never change the course of the
Republic. Freedom is more than trade, liberty than wealth.
Our fathers have said so twice. We shall not faU to repeat the
word, if it must bo spoken.

29
The poor slave wiU also burn in the hot breath of this fiery
furnace. The master fears his slave more than he hates the
North. He will feel the scourge of that fear. It is one of the
necessities of tyrants that they can preserve their power, and
even their Ufe, only by the frequent deaths of their enslaved sub
jects. Sicilian prisons, Neapolitan dungeons, Roman inquisitions,
every where, every when, has triuraphant sin taught us that this ne
cessity is laid upon it. So it is now where this worst of sins holds
completest sway. No dungeon of Venice or Rome or Naples
ever vied with CaroUna prisons or Alabama plantations in the ex-
crutiating cruelty which the helpless victiras of their fear and
hate receive at their hands. When the secrets of this prison
house shall be revealed, you wiU cease to wonder at the tortures
of Messina and Palerrao. No woraan suffered there, only a few
score of men. Here tenderest women suffer such cruelty daily,
as hard-hearted heathen Rome, the most cruel of the ancient
nations, would have shrunk from inflicting. Read Olmstead's late
" Tour Through the Back Country," and you wUl find incidents
of these tortures, inflicted so coolly and carelessly, as show thern
to be a coraraon matter of daily and indifferent outrage. But he
never saw the slave roasting at the stake. Hg never saw the
fierce bloodhounds tearing in pieces the tender flesh of fainting
women. He never saw, as a friend of mine did, hiraself once a
slaveholder, a frantic mother torn from a nursing babe, less than
a year old, and dragged shrieking down thp public street of a
Missouri vUlage, by men who bore Christian names, and a white
skin, and were, not unlikely, born in Puritan New England of
pious parents. " On horror's head horrors accumulate,"
and the longer we dwell on the dreadful theme, the longer we
seera to wish to dwell. It has an awful fascination about it, like
the hungry, basilisk gaze of the anaconda. " It holds us with its
glittering eye," and wc only escape by a strong effort of the will.
We emerge from the dungeon so full of
" Horrid shapes and shrieks and sights unholy,''
and breathe the upper air of Uberty, as an angel might feel who
had escaped from Pandemonium revelry and outrage into the pure

30
society of the blessed. Alas, unlike the angel, we do not leave
only sinners and damned spirits behind us, rioting in their willing
wickedness, but pure and lovely souls, pure as the spirits of the just
made perfect, lovely as their angels, who do always behold the face
of their Father which is in heaven, — these we leave behind, suf-
ffering such shame, such sorrow, such anguish of body and of soul
as only God can feel, only He can relieve, only He can avenge.
Thank God, that worse than heU shall be swept frora the earth.
The Administration may not, will not, directly, aid it. The party
in power is forbidden to do it, rightfully, constitutionally forbidden.
It can only be done peacefully and properly by themselves. It
will be so done. The warm air of freedom gliding over all that
icy region will relax, wUl dissolve these chains. The great ex
ample of eighteen States of the confederacy, voluntarily emanci
pating their slaves, or voluntarily endorsing the act by which the
nation rescued their domain from its polluting presence, wiU not be
lost upon them. They have lost the post of Master. They will
soon be wUling to take that of a pupU. They wiU begin to see as
they are seen. Thej' have pompously proclairaed to the despised
North, " I ara rich and increased with goods and have need of
nothing." They will now see that they are " wretched, and rais
erable, and poor, and blind, and naked." They will then come to
that state of humility which will incline them to buy of us " gold
tried in the fire," the gold of universal emancipation, " that they
may be rich, and white raiment," the wedding robes of liberty
and holiness, " that they may be clothed, and that the shame of
their nakedness do not appear." " They will anoint their eyes
with the eye salve " of northern prosperity, " and wiU see."
Thus learning, thus seeing, the generous spirits that now pant
speechless in that prison of silence and death, will give their heart
a tongue. The free, white, ruUng South wUl speak every where
and speak one voice. Tokens of such coraing utterance are al
ready given. North Carolina has spoken through the lips of Mr.
Helper and Professor Hedrick ; South Carolina haUed this reform,
at its inauguration, in the persons of her Grimkes and Brisbane,
and in this very canvass. Professor Lieber, late of her University
has boldly denounced her treason and its cause, and cast his vote

for freedom. Kentucky and Virginia already pour forth consent
ing voices, Uke the volume and the sound of many waters, whUe
Missouri and Delaware are upon the verge of planting the standard
of emancipation on the summit of their capitols.
This revival of Jeffersonian, of Washingtonian abolitionism, with
more than the fervor and with more than the practical purpose of
those reformers, on their own soU and araong their own posterity,
will sweep through the masses, and one fire blaze in all breasts,
— the celestial fire of universal liberty. The struggles of the en
slaved, their sufferings, their deaths for personal freedom, not
infrequent and not powerless even now, wiU increase, and increase
the zeal of their generous advocates ; and ere the hundredth anni
versary of our nation's birth is reached, — the Fourth of July,
1876, — we shall have completed the work undertaken at our be
ginning. The bell that rung out the first birthday in the ears of
all the nations, will ring out its first centennial with the prophetic
words inscribed upon it, — '¦'¦Proclaim Liberty throughout all the
land to ALL the inhabitants thereof ;" — no longer prophecy, to be
accomplished by a long and perilous and bloody path, but blessed,
unchanging history.
We have given it a long lease of power, brief as it may appear
to you, in allowing four Presidential terms to pass before it dis
appears. But we know that three thousand millions of property
are not to be destroyed in an instant, except by a bloody uprising.
We hope and pray that there may be no such reprisals. It may
go down by a bloodless revolution. Garibaldi has shown how
nearly bloodless an insurrection may be in this age of the world.
Had there been no standing armies in Sicily and Naples, they
would have achieved their liberty without the sacrifice of a single
life. There are no standing armies in the Slave States. A Gar
ibaldi, from the enslaved race, may secure their liberation without
the shedding of a drop of blood. God grant that it may be so.*
# The statement of Mr. Buchanan, in his late message, that the slaves .ire
becoming " uneasy," is a most remarkable confession of a most important witness.
This uneasiness exists raore in the Gulf States than on the border. For tlie latter
gets rid of its dangerous element through the two outlets of Southern trade and
tho underground raih-oad. Those Northern slaves, that have been sold' South,
because they were unmanagable, are united with the superior native slaves of that

32
But we look raore to the liberal action of the white race than to
any violent action of the black. We shall see the sentiraent of
the States gradually changing. Then their poUcy wiU change.
Law after law, the worst, first, will be repealed ; untU, under one
grand impulse of conscience, they will pull down the whole fabric,
and the slave shall stand beside his master, his free and acknow
ledged equal.
All this will not take place without such commotion as we have
not yet seen nor dreamed of. Threats of disunion, and probably
a brief indulgence in that suicidal reraedy, will be made by the
more insane of the maniacs. We have seen some agitation at the
North, in the last thirty years, some mobs and murders have des
ecrated the free States, in their endeavors to relieve theraselves
from the influence alone of slavery. What wUl not that bloody
power do in a life and death struggle which is now to arise in its
own dorainions, where it has held unquestioned and unliraited sway
for two hundred years ? The war has passed frora the North to
the South, and the thirty thousand vptes just cast there for Ub
erty, show that the war wiU not cease, come what may, fall who
may, till that twelve millions are delivered from their few hundred
thousand masters, and freedom of every kind, for every man,
shall be the glad possession of the whole people.
This must be the work of time. Yet the change is rapid from
day-break to dawn ; more rapid and brief frora dawn to sunrise.
And when the sun rises, darkness flees to its caves, though a few
shadows raay linger araong the rays till the mid-day brightness
burns thera up. So wUl it be with this cause. The day is
breaking. A grey light streaks across the darkened heavens.
The next Presidential election will bring the rosy dawn that will
send its warra flush athwart the whole horizon. The third will be
the perfect sunrise. The fourth the noon-tide glory, that shall
section, who, if on the border, would escape to Canada. These violent and rest
less men, kept from liberty by a. wall five hundred miles thick, will, in time, in
the very nature of things, rise upon their masters. These masters, by their mad
ness, are tempting the insurrection. There is the fire, there the powder. If an ex
plosion comes, it will come there first. God grant, the masters raay escape the ter
rible danger by immediate preparation for ultimate, if not jnstant, emancipation.

33
consume every ray of slavery blackness that has laid so thick and
heavy across the nation's sky.
Let us rejoice. Let us shout for joy. Oppression shall not
always reign. Oppression has ceased to reign in its highest,
strongest seat. It wUl soon abandon its lower thrones of State
sovereignty, cast down headlong by the people whom it has so long
deluded and betrayed. It will then flee from those private, do
mestic seats of tyranny, upon the multitude of which, the, fifteen
seats of State authority have been erected, upon which fifteen,
faithfully knit together, the throne of their national power has
been elevated. An aroused people wiU extirpate it from these
obscure, but central ^eats, and the gigantic sin that swells vast
to heaven, wUl flee from the earth to its native, nethermost hell.
Let us pray for this hour ; let us labor for it in all righteous
and loving ways. Our real work is just begun. We have only
broken down a barrier that opposed our march. That march
must yet be made. We have only compelled the haughty trans
gressors to Usten. Our entreaties, our warnings, our encourage
ments are yet to. be poured into the opened ear. We have only
attained the outmost edge of the broad table land of free discus
sion. The high land must yet be traveUed. Remember that this
deed is nothing unless it bring -forth fruit better than itself. The
object upon which we must fix our eye, the prize that must be
won, the goal that must be reached, is the abolition of slavery,
THE LIBERATION OP EVERY SLAVE.
Let US discuss, in a spirit of prudence and liberality, every
measure that seeks this end. Let us bring every reason that
worldly success, humane sentiment or religious obligation can
suggest to bear upon the hearts of their masters. Let us aid
those who are anxious to be released from this relation out of the
abundant wealth of the North, that they may not be kept from
this duty by the gaunt forra of poverty staring them in the face,
and certain to be their portion, if they strip themselves of all
their inherited, though unrighteous possessions. Let us, at least,
assist them, if they need, or will receive no remuneration for the
discharge of their duty, by providing for these emancipated breth
ren a home on free soU, which they cannot enjoy on the slave. We
5

34
must bring our money to bear upon this sin, if we would see it
peacefully die. Let us do it wisely, generously, speedily.*
Let us especially feel for the slave. The lot, the loss of the
master is nothing to his. His is a hapless, horrible fate. Never
forget him. In your morning prayers remember him upon whom
the morning breaks, only to light him to his rewardless tasks.
AVhen gathering round the family altar and the family table, pity
those who have no such comforts. At your evening devotions
pray for those who go to cheerless couches, bowed down with
dreadful memories and more dreadful fears. Remember that the
Lord had these sufferers before him, no less than his chosen peo
ple, when he said, " This is a people robbed and peeled ; they
are all of them snared in holes, and they are hid in prison
houses ; they are for a prey, and none delivereth ; for a spoU,
and none saith. Restore!" Never, never forget them. They are
your brothers and sisters. They shall stand in equal liberty with
you, delivered by the right arm of Him who saved your fathers,
and who has just cast down their leagued oppressors from their
lofty seats.
What a day that day of deliverance wiU be, — the great and
acceptable day of the Lord ; — a day sure to come ; a day, I be
lieve, soon to come. Behold that vast and beautiful region, from
the peaceful Ohio to the sunny Gulf, from the swift Mississippi to
the raging Atlantic, as it now rests under the gloora of this awful
sin. All the refineraents, all the enterprises of civilized life pause
at its borders, or creep feebly through it like solitary star-rays
through midnight clouds. The magnificent landscape is rarely
cheered with the flying train, rarely adorned with the lovely ham
let, the prosperous viUage, the mighty city. The church lifts but
seldom its defiled hand to heaven, and lifts that hand only to
point to the judgment of God on its fearful sin in compelling the
bride of Christ to corarait adultery with Belial. No school-house
appears, fuU of the neighborhood's children, no farms trodden by
their humble, but independent owners ; no culture, prosperity,
piety. The sight most frequent, is the miserable slave toiling
* See Appendix B.

with barbaric implements in the rudest forms of menial service ;
or the more miserable white man, degraded beneath the slave he
despises, idle, intemperate, ignorant, ill-mannered.
Thus stands that vast land to-day. Let the hour corae for
which we are praying and laboring, to which the great deed of
the past week has made the grandest stride that the century has
seen ; let but that hour come, when every man shall be free, and
how changed the spectacle. The wUderness, that blossoms Uke
the rose in wild fertility, shall be transformed into the smiling
abode of free, industrious, inteUigent man. Railroads shall rush
through every vaUey, bearing the famishing of all nations to the
rich treasures nature has there in store for them. Beautiful roads
will wind beside every stream, scale every mountain, pierce every
forest. Rich embowered cottages, such as no northern sun or
soil can. give, will line every pathway, wUl cluster in frequent
centres, will multiply, at brief intervals, into great coraraunities,
with the great factories, and great warehouses, and spacious stores,
and crowded streets of growing cities. The school-house, raodest
or majestic, as it stands in viUage or city, will be filled with the
young of all famUies, white and black, as with us, unconscious of
difference or prejudice ; alike growing in knowledge and affection.
No slave whip whistles through the resisting air, rushing down
upon the shrinking flesh of saintly woraan. No agonizing hus
bands and wives, mothers and babes, are dragged to the raarket-
place, and there torn, husband frora wife, mother from child,
never to raeet again till they appear together as witnesses on the
stand at the bar of God against these murderers of their liberty,
their love, their life. No gangs of men and women, sUent and
sad, raove monotonously over the broad acres, to the ceaseless
look and lash of the cruel overseer. No wretched hovel, with its
earthen floor and heap of straw, filled for a few short hours with
the half-starved slaves, blotches the lovely landscape. All these
are gone, and gone forever.
The white fields shall blossom under the free and active indus
try of every class. Comfort shall gladden every home. Willing
labor shall garner the land. The free and happy, busy and pop
ulous, wealthy and. cultivated North shaU cover the whole land,

36
and equal freedom and happiness, energy and prosperity, culture
and piety, will be the possession of every man. Above all, the
Church of Christ, the Divine Liberator, will point its sacred finger
to the Infinite Lover and Redeemer of all men, to the everlasting
freedora of heaven. ' In its walls, without distinction of color or
condition, without negro pews, or negro galleries, or negro corners,
all souls shall bow in the loving unity of " one Lord, one faith,
one baptism," before " the one God and Father of all, who is
above all, and through aU, and in all " that love Him, equaUy
and eternaUy..
-No dim and distant prophecy of millennial glory is this. The
day is nigh at hand. It has already dawned. It shall speed
Uy arise. '¦ Surely I corae quickly. Amen ! Even so, come.
Lord Jesus !"

APPENDIX.

BUNKER S HILL AND HARPER S FERRY.
The analogy between these two historic events has been suggested by
several speakers and writers. Ittas not been as carefully elaborated as it
deserves to be, and will be bjr future historians. It may not be amiss to
state a few of the points of resemblance they will detect, both in respect
to the enterprises themselves, and their real leaders.
They are not unlike in rashness, viewed in the light of cool, sagacious
generalship. Consider the former. Fifteen hundred untrained soldiers,
with only four rounds apiece of cartridge and ball, planted themselves be
hind a mere bank of turf and sticks, thrown up in less than twelve hours,
within a few rods of a ship channel, where the enemy's men-of-war lay, and
whence they could rake them on three sides, and cut off their retreat on
the fourth. Consider, farther, that a great city was less than a mile distant,
full of ammunition and of thoroughly trained soldiers, and its nearest emi
nence, in height and distance, commanded their site as perfectly as though
it had been perched over their heads but a rood off. Is there greater mil
itary wisdom in putting such a handful of raw militia into such a trap, than
Capt. Brown showed in his operations ? Wellington or Washington would
have never undertaken the former any sooner than the latter.
If we look at each of them, as they appeared to the hopes or even the
dreams of Warren and of Brown, we shall find them not dissimilar. No his
torian ever has clearly set forth the immediate practical good that the en
campment on Bunker's Hill was intended, or desired to effect ; — we doubt
if they ever will. It could not have been dreamed for a moment, that their
position could be retained for any length of time. Without shelter, with
out rocky ramparts, or means to erect them, without ammunition, or cannon,
or provision, shut off from all communication with the main army as com
pletely as if in a besieged fortress, they could not have hoped for any thing
bjjt a bloody battle, fruitless in its immediate results, even if successful, or

a final submission of the whole force by the slow, bnt, in this case, most
certain process of siege. Had not the British been rash with rage and pride,
they could have had the whole fifteen hundred in their hands in less than a
week, without the loss of a man, as easily as the Virginians could have
starved Capt. Brown into surrender, had they too, had the grace of patience.
It may be said the Americans made a blunder, and located themselves
nearer Boston, and on a lower hill than they intended. So the leader of
the Harper's Ferry enterprise said he made a blunder, and did not follow
any of his plans in entering the arsenal. History will give them both the
benefits of their claim, if she gives either. What then ? The hill they in
tended to occupy is just as completely shut off from the camp, as the one
they fortified. It has only one advantage over the latter. This one, is
overtopped by Copp's Hill in Boston, that one, not. It is, however, within
reach of its fire, as well as tbat of the fleet. The mountains on which Brown
said he meant to establish himself, are not subject to like objection. The en
terprise of Putnam, Prescott and Warren, has not any such claim to real ne
cessity as must be allowed to the fight at Lexington and the fortification of
Dorchester Heights. It was a trial battle. It would have always been'
branded as criminally foolish, but for the higher than strategetical, or so
called practical reasons, which incited it, and especially but for the won
derful fruits it brought forth in the hearts of friends and foes. Will not
the future historian of the great conflict of slavery and freedom find like
analogies in the events of Harper's Ferry ? In one respect we pray and
believe they will totally differ. The former was the prelude of a long and
cruel civil war. The latter, we hope, will prove to be the only bloody in
terruption to the peaceable progress of this cause. It will certainly have
this relation, if the slave masters learn more wisdom from this event than
our British masters did from Bunker's Hill.
We cannot fail to notice the remarkable resemblance of the real leaders
of these enterprises, both in respect to their own temperament, as well as
in their relation to their associates in the general movement. Warren
differed as much from the other great leaders in the cause of liberty then,
as John Brown did from those of to-day. His .voice was fierce for war long
before the others considered the argument of peace exhausted. His deeds
were like his words. On the Lexington day, he was fighting in the ranks,
while Hancock and Samuel Adams, equally great patriots, and esteemed by
the king far more dangerous rebels, felt it their duty to seek safety in flight.
His rash courage almost sealed his fate that day. For at West Cambridge
a ball passed so near his head as to carry away the pin that fastened his car-
lock. Had he been captured at Bunker's Hill, as he undoubtedly would
have been but for the fortunate stab of a bayonet, he would, most certainly,
have been hungxwithiji a month on Boston Common, by the Governor of
Massachusetts, for " murder, treason, and inciting to insurrection."

39
There are only two points of difference between these transactions. The
first, that those who fought were, in the one case, themselves the victims of
the oppression ; in the other, chiefly sympathizers with these victims.
This is not quite true, though constantly asserted. For colored men, free
and slave, were engaged at Harper's Ferry. Some were slain, some es
caped, some were captured and hung. It was planned and perfected, theo
retically, among the fugitives of Canada. Col. Washington's favorite slave
was among the slain, and no one knows, no one can know, till slavery is
abolished, how great an army was pledged to meet at the rendezvous in the
mountains. The second point of difference is, that much legislative and military pre
paration preceded the former encounter, none, the latter. It will be no
ticed, in connection with- this fact, that the ruling government of Massachu
setts had allowed, for many years, mass meetings, congresses, petitions of
its subjects, the collection of military stores, and, at last, permitted 14,000
of these rebels to be encamped under arms within three miles of its capitol.
Suppose Virginia had granted its subjects such privileges, would they not
have developed civil and military leaders, and executed enterprises of great
pith and moment, without the aid of a foreign arm ? Let us reflect that
history, whieh is the voice of humanity, never takes into acQount, in its ulti
mate and irreversible judgment, immediate success or failure. The final
.cause rules here as every where. Warren and Bunker's Hill are still,
and ever will be, the most thrilling names of the Revolutionary struggle.
Those to whose liberty they are dedicated, have compelled all nations to do
them reverence, by their own unceasing, enthusiastic devotion. So the
like, yet far greater admiration of the Afric- American race, when they shall
have achieved their freedom, will compel all the world to revere the names
of John Brown and Harper's Ferry. Their representative shall yet stand
with the descendant of John Brown and the successor of Governor Wise,
in mutual amity and grateful reverence before a commemorative monu
ment at Harper's Ferry, as the descendants of George the Third and Joseph
Warren lately stood, with the representative of emancipated Massachusetts,
cordial and reverent, before the sacred memorials of Bunker's Hill.

B.
A MANUMISSION AID SOCIETY — THE RIGHT WAY TO ABOLISH SLAVERY.
We take the liberty of reprinting a part of a letter, which was sent to
the Tremont Temple Convention of Dec. 3d. If developes, somewhat
fully, the idea advanced on page 34, and urges what seems to us the most
imperative and immediate duty of all who love the slave and his master : —

40
the employment of the immense private wealth of the country for their
mutual salvation. We commend it to the earnest consideration of all those
who are willing to pay as well as pray, for the extinction of slavery.
# » « * » * *»
It has long been my opinion that slavery would not die bloodlessly, unless
the moneyed power was brought to bear against it. All other forces are
largely immaterial. They address the conscience, the sympathies, the
fears, the abstract political relations of the slaveholder. This is primarily
and pre-eminently material. Every body can understand what it means
and what it does. Other powers expend themselves in words of denuncia
tion, resolution orlegislation, all alike costless and most of them, practically,
useless. The bestowing of our goods to ransom the poor slave will appeal
directly to the sympathies of the master and summon him to similar, and
even greater sacrifices. Other activities awaken the bitterest opposition ;
this disarms all hostility. For the warmest friend of slavery cannot become
enraged at the generous sacrifice of private property for its extinction.
Finally, by arraying the vast moneyed power in the right way and in the
right spirit against this evil, we shall bring the least and greatest of its foes
to one act, and thus gradually to one feeling, in respect to all the' other
right modes of assailing it, and so hasten the glad hour of universal eman
cipation. How then shall the wealth of the North be brought to bear directly
against slavery ? Different minds will answer this question differently.
Some will say by colonization movements to Africa, Hayti, or Central
America. Others will say by national taxation for the purchase of the so-
called property. Without discussing these views, or those of any other
philanthropists, allow me to say that, in my opinion, this can be most easily
obtained and most effectively used by organizing a society, which shalt secure
to emancipated slaves, homes in the free States, which they cannot now have in
the slave; and shall also offer to the master, if he is unable or unwilling to
gratuitously liberate them — a slight remuneration for his great pecuniary
sacrifice. In a word, we want, A Manumission Aid Society.
Permit me to notice these two points a little more in detail :
First, We need a society that shall provide homes for those who would
be emancipated, were it not for the laws, almost universal in the slave
States, which forbid their manumission on the soil. The cases of conscience
are not infrequent, even in the present reign of terror, of masters who are
giving their slaves their liberty. In Maryland, between the time of the en
actment of the law last winter forbidding the emancipation of slaves, and
the fourth of last July, when it was to go into effect, between eighty and
ninety slaves were set at liberty, in one county alone. Masters not unfre
quently appear with fheir servants in our northern courts to execute the
deed of manumission. If a few thus obey their conscience under all their
impediments, social, religious and legal, would not many do it, if there was

41
« responsible society to encourage them, by receiving their slaves and giving
them a comfortable home, and a fair start in life ?
Those who are most moved to this duty have the most regard for their
slaves. Many of them are ignorant of the North. Many have no means
of giving them an outfit in addition to their liberty. They cannot drive
them into unknown and inhospitable regions. Hence, they pause in
their ignorance and anxiety, and too often sink back into indifference, and
<3Ie in that state, leaving their slaves to their fate. A Manumission Aid
Society would remove all these natural objections, arouse the slumbering
oonsciences, and meet with a hearty response from a large class of convicted
slav«liolders. It will find a home for the slaves, either here or abroad, as
might seem best in each case. It will meet the kind hearted master, for all
such masters are kind hearted, with deeds that will speak more forcibly
than all our words possibly can.
But a second benefit resulting from such a society, will be the material
aid it will afford to those masters who are almost persuaded to liberate their
slaves, and who are restrained by the thought that the deed will utterly im
poverish them. Wo want a society that shall say to these penitent slave
holders, " If you will not give up your slaves without some help, we will
give you that help. We do not recognize your title to them. We, simply
as a charity to you, give you a little out of our wealth, or out of our poverty,
as would most frequently be the case, to aid you in following your conscience
whither It now leads you." We should prefer, and, as far as possible, se
cure, their gratuitous liberation. But tbe salvation of the poor slave, so
near his Uberty and which he can reach by sa slight a donation on our
part, ought to urge us to this benevolence. Let us remove the chief, almost
the only stumbling block that lies in tbe way of the duty of conscientious
masters — the fear of poverty. This has been<ione again and again, in the
temperance movement. It has in this. One of our greatest philanthro
pists and abolitionists informed me that on one occasion he ransomed ten
slaves for .SIOOO, and on another, five slaves by paying $400. Let all anti-
slavery men, through a responsible society. Imitate this ex,cellent example,
and they will find hundreds of masters equally, yea, more liberal than these>
who so generously responded to his generous offers.
Many lesser yet not unimportant benefits might be named- Allow me to
trespass a little farther on your time by mentioning one or two of them :
First, such a society would relieve us of almost all of our present private
donations for the purchase of slaves, which if they could be ascertained,
would be found to amount to a vast sum. Much of this is obtained under
false pretences, rauch of it is fruitless through failure to collect the amount
required, and all of it very costly. - For every one so liberated, ten to
twerity, possibly twice these numbers, coiild be set fi^ee through this
society. 6

42
Another very important benefit would be the union of the anti-slavery
sentiment on a practical and effective basis. The late election reveals the
fact that only six hundred thousand, out of four and a half million of voters,
are bound, body and soul, to slavery. However feebly the anti-slavery
feeling moves in the breasts of many of the remaining three millions and
nine hundred thousand, it exists there, and such a society would do more
to develope it than any other instrumentality.
But if we take Mr. Lincoln's vote alone, and join with it the abolitionists,
whose conscience forbade their supporting bim, we shall have nearly. If not
quite, two millions of men, who are directly, and, most of them, strongly op
posed to slavery. Cannot this great multitude be united in a voluntary,
practical measure for Its abolition ? No such measure seems to me to be
before the country ; none, certainly, that will enlist their purses as well as
their hearts. Politicians are almost as cautious as financiers. The party
coming into power Is prevented from any direct efforts to abolish slavery.
Cannot a society be organized in which all can constitutionally, earnestly,
liberally work ? Will not this society aflbrd tliat basis ?
It may be said emancipation, by purchase, is no new idea. We acknow
ledge it; if it were, we should doubt its wisdom. It has often been said
that compensation must be given for the slaves ; but it has always, so far as
I am aware, been said that such compensation should be given by the gen
eral or local governments to the local governments; — Congress or the free
States treating with the slave States, or the slave holders, as a mass. Mr.
Webster advocated appropriating the proceeds of the Public Lands for this
object. Mr. Seward advocated buying up the slaves In the District of Co
lumbia, with the consent of all the masters, by appropriations from the na
tional treasury. Rev. Dr. Bangs, and within a few years, Mr. Burritt, have
advocated special taxation for this purpose. Rev. Dr. Thomson, in tbe
Christian Advocate and Journal, and Mr. Thurlow Weed, in the Albany
Journal, have lately advanced similar ideas. All of these are misled by
the English mode of abolishing slavery. Our governments, local or na
tional, unlike the European governments, rarely engage in works of pure
benevolence. They help them, but they do not Institute or maintain them.
This is done almost exclusively by voluntary societies. All of our religious,
and almost all of our charitable aud higher educational movements, are
managed by such organizations. The peculiarity of the idea we advocate
is, that It conforms to these habits and tastes of our people. It is a volun
tary society, like the American Colonization or Kansas Aid Societies, both
of which have been aided by State appropriations.
Let it once enter the list of our charities, and it would speedily surpass
them all. Scores of men and women will be found in every village, hun
dreds In every city, who will collect moneys for its treasury, and will assist
in securing for the slaves that come into its hands, pleasant and prosperous

43
homes. Money would pour into its coffers from all classes, from those of
every shade of opinion.
The greatest of these voluntary qharities, the American Bible Society,
has an annual income of about $450,000. But this society has not a tithe
of the hold upon the hearts of the people, npr can it elicit but a fraction of
the support that a Manumission Aid Society, rightly organized and officered,
could command. Yet consider how powerful a society would be, receiving,
as a free gift, such an annual Income as this, and expending it in the ran
som of slaves and their home or foreign colonization. But such a society
would have a much larger income than this. No Legislature, State or Na
tional, alids the Bible Society. They would all aid one devoted to the
cause of voluntary emancipation. Mr. Everett, who has by his eloquence
rescued the home of Washington from infamy, would be imitated by hun
dreds of orators, laboring to rescue the land of Washington from far deeper
infamy. Perhaps he would himself lead these followers In this noblest of
enterprises. If each of the two millions of avowed opponents of slavery
give an average of one dollar per annum, for Its peaceful extinction, we
should have two millions of dollars for annual disbursement. We believe a
larger income than this could be secured ; for multitudes, South as well as
North, slaveholders and non-slaveholders, who would not vote directly
against slavery, would gladly aid in such an effort to exterminate it. Thus,
with abundant means at command, it would rapidly eliminate the oonscieh-
tious masters from their more violent and wicked associates, and even these
bitter enemies of freedom, melted by our large liberality, would cease to
rage, cease to resist, until finally, all conspiring together, the South and the
North, by private and public charity, by State and National appropriations,
the great iniquity shall be lifted from every ne,ck, and all sit In freedom.
and happiness under the equal protection of justice and liberty. Lest this
estimate should appear extravagant, allow me to quote an extract from Mr.
Emerson's speech in New York, in 1856. By Inserting the word "Soci
ety" for " State,'' we have the very idea of this association, and an eloquent
statement of its means and results.
" Why, in the name of common sense and the peace of mankind, is not
the summary or gradual abolition of slavery, in accordance with the Inter
ests of the South and the settled conscience of the North, made the subject
of instant negotiation and settlement ? Because it is property ? Then It
has a price. It is not a really great task to buy that property of the
planter. I say, buy, never conceding the right of the planter to own, but
acknowledging the calamity of his position and willing to bear a country
man's share in relieving him, and because it is the only practicable course,
and is innocent. [Loud applause.] Was there ever any contribution so
entluisiastlcally paid as this will be ? Every man will bear his part. We
will give up our coaches, and wine and watches. The church will melt its
plate. The Father of his country shall wait, well pleased, a little longer
for his monument. Franklin shall wait for his, the Pilgrim Fathers for
theirs, and Columbus, who waited all his mortality for justice, shall wait a

44
part of his immortality also. We will call upon those rich beneficiaries who
found asylums, hospitals, Lowell institutes and Astor libraries, upon wealthy
bachelors and wealthy maidens, to make the State [Society] their heirs, as
they were wont to do at Rome. The rich shall give of their riches, the
merchants of their commerce, the mechanics their strength ; the needle
women will give, and the children will have a cent society. Every man in
the land would give a week's work to dig away this accursed, mountain of
slavery, and force it forever out of the world."
These views are submitted with the hope that they will aid in the peace-
fill settlement of the most important and most difficult question that is before
the age.

YALE UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY

Gift of
STUART W. JACKSON
Yale 1898