Before leaving Boston, I had a long interview with William Lloyd Garrison. His view of "women's rights" is so far a matter of conscience with him, as to be made an indispensable term of union; yet though widely differing on this, and other important points, we parted, I trust, as we met, on personally friendly terms; and certainly on my part with a desire to promote a spirit of forbearance, and with a deeper and stronger conviction that the friends of the bleeding and oppressed slave, should not spend their strength in unprofitable contention upon points in regard to which both parties claim to act conscientiously, while the common cause requires their undivided energies.
On the 28th I left Boston for the beautiful town of Worcester, about forty miles distant, on the principal line of railway to New York, where I had the pleasure of visiting, at his own residence, my friend, Cyrus P. Grosvenor, one of the delegates to the Anti-Slavery Convention last year. There are here a considerable number of sincere abolitionists, of whom we met a small company in the evening, in a room used as the Friends' meeting house. I gave them a brief account of the state of the anti-slavery cause in other parts of the world. In company with John M. Earle, editor of one of the Worcester papers, with whom I had formed a previous acquaintance at the Yearly Meeting, I also called on the Governor of the State of Massachusetts, who resides in this place. We had some friendly conversation, but he seemed cautious on the subject of abolition. The temperance cause in Worcester has made so much progress that at the three largest and best hotels, which make up nearly one hundred beds each, no intoxicating liquor of any kind is sold. A people thus willing to carry out their convictions, to the sacrifice of prejudice, appetite, and apparent self-interest, cannot long remain a nation of slave-holders. In common with the rest of New England, this town is remarkable for the number, size, and beauty of its places of worship. I calculated, with the aid of a well-informed inhabitant, that if the entire population were to go to a place of worship, at the same hour, in the same day, there would be ample accommodation, and room to spare. Yet here there is no compulsory tax to build churches, and maintain ministers. By the efficacy of the voluntary principle alone is this state of things produced.
My dear friend, John G. Whittier returned home from Worcester on account of increased indisposition, while I proceeded alone to New York. The journey from Boston to the latter city is a remarkably pleasant one. Leaving Boston at four in the afternoon, we proceed on one of the best railways in the States, at the rate of upwards of twenty miles an hour, through a very beautiful and generally well cultivated country, to the city of Norwich, in the State of Connecticut, where the train arrives about eight in the evening, and the passengers immediately embark on a handsome steamer, for New York, enjoying, as long as daylight lasts, the fine scenery on the banks of the Thames. The night I went was moonlight; and, after long enjoying the coolness of the evening on deck, the company retired to their berths, and arrived at New York at the seasonable hour of six the following morning.
I remained in New York until the 7th of the Seventh Month (July). My friends, William Shotwell and wife, had left the city during the hot months, but very kindly placed their town house at my service, and I found the retirement thus at my command both refreshing and very serviceable, in enabling me to bring up arrears of writing. During this interval, I spent one very pleasant day with Theodore and Angelina Grimke Weld, and their sister, Sarah Grimke, who reside on a small farm, a few miles from Newark. To the great majority of my readers these names need no introduction; yet, for the benefit of the few, I will briefly allude to their past history. When the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed, in 1833, Theodore D. Weld was at the Lane Seminary, near Cincinnati, Ohio. He was unable to attend on that occasion, but wrote a letter, declaring his entire sympathy with its object. Soon after, through the influence and exertions of himself and Henry B. Stanton, a large majority of the students at Lane Seminary, comprising several slave-holders and sons of slave-holders, became members of an Anti-Slavery Society. The Faculty opposed the formation of this society, and finally expelled its members from the seminary. For two or three years after, Theodore Weld was engaged in anti-slavery effort, principally in the States of Ohio and New York. His voice failed at last, and for several years he was unable to address a public assembly. Angelina Grimke Weld, and her sister, Sarah Grimke, were natives of South Carolina, the daughters of a distinguished Judge of that State; for several years they resided in Philadelphia. Having long felt a deep interest in the condition of the slaves, in the year 1837 they, in accordance with what they believed to be a sense of religious duty, visited New York and New England, to plead the cause of those, with whose sorrows, degradation, and cruel sufferings, they had been familiar in their native State. They are evidently women of superior endowments, kind-hearted and energetic, and still retain something of the warmth and fervor of character peculiar to the South.
Few, even of the well informed abolitionists of England, have an adequate idea of the extent, variety, and excellence of the anti-slavery literature of the United States, or of the amount of intellectual power which has been willingly consecrated to this service. Of the cause itself, with all its exigencies, we may adopt, in a yet more limited sense, the sentiment of the Christian poet, on the transient nature of all sublunary things,
"These, therefore, are occasional, and pass."
The time approaches when the shackles of the slave will fall off—when his suffering and despairing cry will be no more heard. Slavery itself is a temporary exigency; but its removal has called, and will yet call forth, works bearing the impress of intellectual supremacy, which will be embodied in the permanent literature of the age, and will contribute to raise the character, and to extend the reputation, of that literature. The names of Channing, Jay, Child, Green, and Pierpont, are already their own passport to fame. Other names might be mentioned; but, one instance excepted, selection might be invidious. That exception is Theodore D. Weld, whose palm of superiority few would be disposed to contest. His principal works are, "The Bible against Slavery;" "Power of Congress over Slavery in the District of Columbia;" and "Slavery as it is."
All his writings are marked by varied excellence; yet their chief characteristic is an irresistible and overwhelming power of argument. Although brief and compressed in style, he exhausts his subject; and his two principal works, though on warmly controverted topics, have never been replied to. He would be a bold antagonist who should enter the lists against him: he would be a yet bolder ally who should attempt to go over the same ground, or to do better what has been done so well.
One of the most voluminous and popular writers that ever lived, observed to a friend, "that he was more proud of his compositions for manure, than of any other compositions with which he had any concern." My friend, has the same love of rural occupations, and has found severe manual labor essential for the recovery of health, broken by labor of another kind. I found him at work on his farm, driving his own wagon and oxen, with a load of rails. When he had disposed of his freight, we mounted the wagon, and drove to his home. Two or three of his fellow-students at the Lane Seminary arrived about the same time, and we spent the day in agreeable, and, I trust, profitable intercourse. In the household arrangements of this distinguished family, Dr. Graham's dietetic system is rigidly adopted, which excludes meat, butter, coffee, tea, and all intoxicating beverages. I can assure all who may be interested to know, that this Roman simplicity of living does not forbid enjoyment, when the guest can share with it the affluence of such minds as daily meet at their table. The "Graham system," as it is called, numbers many adherents in America, who are decided in its praise.
My friends, Theodore D. and Angelina Weld, and Sarah Grimke, sympathize, to a considerable extent, with the views on "women's rights," held by one section of abolitionists; yet they deeply regret that this, or any other extraneous doctrine, should have been made an apple of discord; and, since the rise of these unhappy divisions, they have held aloof from both the anti-slavery organizations, though, as among the most able and successful laborers in the field, they may justly be accounted allies by each party. Difference of opinion on these points did not, for a moment, interrupt the pleasure of our intercourse; and I could not but wish, that those, of whatever party, who are accustomed to judge harshly of all who cannot pronounce their "shibboleth," might be instructed by the candid, charitable, and peace-loving deportment of Theodore D. Weld.