[ CHAPTER XII. ]
We have seen, a few pages back, that Angelina expressed her thankfulness at Sarah's change of views with respect to the anti-slavery cause. Again we must regret the destruction of Sarah's letters, which would have shown us by what chains of reasoning her mind at last reached entire sympathy with Angelina's. We can only infer that her progress was rapid after the public rebuke which caused her to turn her back on Philadelphia, and that her sister's brave and isolated position, appealing strongly to her affection, urged her to make a closer examination of the subject of abolitionism than she had yet done. The result we know; her entire conversion in a few weeks to Angelina's views. And from that time she travelled close by her sister's side in this as well as in other questions of reform, drawing her inspiration from Angelina's clearer intuitions and calmer judgment, and frankly and affectionately acknowledging her right of leadership.
The last of August, 1836, the sisters were once more together, Sarah having accepted Mrs. Parker's invitation to come to Shrewsbury. The question of future arrangements was now discussed. Angelina felt a strong inclination to go to New England, and undertake there the same work which the committee in New York wished her to perform, and she even wrote to Mr. Wright that she expected to do so. Feeling also that Friends had the first right to her time and labors, and that, if permitted, she would prefer to work within the Society, she wrote to her old acquaintances, E. and L. Capron, the cotton manufacturers of Uxbridge, Massachusetts, to consult them on the subject. She mentions this in a letter to her friend, Jane Smith, saying:—
"My present feelings lead me to labor with Friends on the manufacture and use of the products of slave-labor. They excuse themselves from doing anything, because they say they cannot mingle in the general excitement, and so on. Now, here is a field of labor in which they need have nothing to do with other societies, and yet will be striking a heavy blow at slavery. These topics the Anti-Slavery Society has never acted upon as a body, and therefore no agent of theirs could consistently labor on them. I stated to E. and L. Capron just how I felt, and asked whether I could be of any use among them, whether they were prepared to have the morality of these things discussed on Christian principles. I have no doubt my Philadelphia friends will oppose my going there, but, Jane, I have realized very sensibly of late that I belong not to them, but to Christ Jesus, and that I must follow the Lamb whithersoever He leadeth.... I feel as if I was about to sacrifice every friend I thought I had, but I still believe with T.D. Weld, that this is 'a cause worth dying for.'"
This is the first mention we find of her future husband, whom she had not yet seen, but whose eloquent addresses she had read, and whose ill-treatment by Western mobs had more than once called forth the expression of her indignation.
The senior member of the firm to which she had written answered her letter in person, and, she says, utterly discouraged her. He said that if she should go into New England with the avowed intention of laboring among Friends on the subject of slavery in any way, her path would be completely closed, and she would find herself entirely helpless. He even went so far as to say that he believed there were Friends who would destroy her character if she attempted anything of the kind. He proposed that she should go to his house for the winter, and employ her time in writing for the Anti-Slavery Society, and doing anything else she could incidentally. But this plan did not suit her. She felt it right to offer her services to Friends first, and was glad she had done so; but if they would not accept them she must take them elsewhere. Besides, when she communicated her plan to Catherine Morris, Catherine objected to it very decidedly, and said she could not go without a certificate and a companion, and these she knew Friends would not grant her.
"Under all these circumstances," Angelina writes, "I felt a little like the apostle Paul, who having first offered the Jews the gospel, and finding they would not receive it, believed it right for him to turn to the Gentiles. Didst thou ever hear anything so absurd as what Catherine says about the certificate and a companion? I cannot feel bound by such unreasonable restrictions if my Heavenly Father opens a door for me, and I do not mean to submit to them. She knows very well that Arch Street Meeting would grant me neither, but as the servant of Jesus Christ I have no right to bow down thus to the authority of man, and I do not expect ever again to suffer myself to be trammelled as I have been. It is sinful in any human being to resign his or her conscience and free agency to any society or individual, if such usurpation can be resisted by moral power. The course our Society is now determined upon, of crushing everything which opposes the peculiar views of Friends, seems to me just like the powerful effort of the Jews to close the lips of Jesus. They are afraid that the Society will be completely broken up if they allow any difference of opinion to pass unrebuked, and they are resolved to put down all who question in any way the doctrines of Barclay, the soundness of Fox, or the practices which are built on them. But the time is fast approaching when we shall see who is for Christ, and who for Fox and Barclay, the Paul and Apollos of our Society."
Her plan of going to New England frustrated, Angelina hesitated no longer about accepting the invitation from New York. But first there was a long discussion of the subject with Sarah, who found it hard to resign her sister to a work she as yet did not cordially approve. She begged her not to decide suddenly, and pointed out all sorts of difficulties—the great responsibility she would assume, her retiring disposition, and almost morbid shrinking from whatever might make her conspicuous; the trial of going among strangers, made greater by her Quaker costume and speech, and lastly, of the almost universal prejudice against a woman's speaking to any audience; and she asked her if, under all these embarrassing circumstances, added to her inexperience of the world, she did not feel that she would ultimately be forced to give up what now seemed to her so practicable. To all this Angelina only answered that the responsibility seemed thrust upon her, that the call was God's call, and she could not refuse to answer it. Sarah then told her that if she should go upon this mission without the sanction of the "Meeting for Sufferings," it would be regarded as a violation of the established usages of the Society, and it would feel obliged to disown her. Angelina's answer to this ended the discussion. She declared that as her mind was made up to go, she could not ask leave of her Society—that it would grieve her to have to leave it, and it would be unpleasant to be disowned, but she had no alternative. Then Sarah, whose loving heart had, during the long talk, been moving nearer and nearer to that of her clear child, surprised her by speaking in the beautiful, tender language of Ruth: "If thou indeed feelest thus, and I cannot doubt it, then my mind too is made up. Where thou goest, I will go; thy God shall be my God, thy people my people. What thou doest, I will, to my utmost, aid thee in doing. We have wept and prayed together, we will go and work together."
And thus fully united, heart and soul and mind, they departed for New York, Angelina first writing to inform the committee of her decision, and while thanking them for the salary offered, refusing to receive any. She also told them that her sister would accompany her and co-operate with her, and they would both bear their own expense.