Speeches, Addresses, And Occasional Sermons Volume Iii Part 15

How many laws of Ma.s.sachusetts have been violated this very week, in this very city, by the slave-hunters here, by the very officers of the State? What is the meaning of this? Every law which favors the acc.u.mulation of money, must be kept; but those which prohibit the unjust acc.u.mulation of money by certain cla.s.ses--they need not be kept.[29]

No doubt it would be a great pity to have the city government careful to keep the laws of the city,--to suppress rum-shops, and save the citizens from the almshouse, the jail, and the gallows. Such laws may be executed at Truro and Wellfleet; but it is quite needless for the officers of "The Athens of America," to attend to the temperance laws.[30]--What a pity for the magistrates of Boston to heed the laws of the State! No; it is the fugitive slave law that they must keep.

II. A great deal of pains has been taken to impress the people with their "moral duty to obey the fugitive slave law." To carry it out, government needs base men; and that, my brothers, is a crop which never fails. Rye and wheat may get blasted many times in the course of years; the potato may rot; apples and peaches fail. But base men never fail.

Put up your black pirate-flag in the market-place, offer "money and office," and they will come as other carrion-vultures to their prey. The olive, the fig, and the orange are limited in their range; even Indian corn and oats will not grow everywhere; but base men are indigenous all the world over, between the tropics, and under a polar sky. No bad scheme ever failed for lack of bad men to carry it out. Do you want to kill Baptists and Quakers in Boston? There are the men for you. To hang "witches" at Salem? There are hangmen in plenty on Gallows Hill. Would James the Second butcher his subjects? He found his "human" tools ready.

Would Elizabeth murder the Puritans and Catholics? There was no lack of ruffians. Would b.l.o.o.d.y Mary burn the Protestants? There were more executioners than victims. Would the Spanish Inquisition torture and put to death the men for whom Christ died? She found priests and "gentlemen," ready for their office. Would Nero murder the Christians, and make a spectacle of their sufferings? Rome is full of scoundrels to do the deed, and teems with spectators rus.h.i.+ng to the amphitheatre at the cry of "Christians to the Lions!" all finding a holiday in their brothers' agony. Would the high-priests crucify the Son of man? They found a commissioner to issue the mandate, a marshal to enforce it, a commissioner to try him by illegal process,--for the process against Christ was almost as unconst.i.tutional as that against Sims,--they found a commissioner ready to condemn Christ, against his own conscience, soldiers ready to crucify him. Ay! and there was a Peter to deny him, and a Judas to betray, and now there is a judge with his legal ethics, to justify the betrayal! I promised not to speak of Judas or the judge again, but they will come up before me! It is true, that, if in Boston, some judicial monster should wish to seethe a man in a pot of scalding water, he would find another John Boilman in Boston, as Judge Jeffries found one in England, in 1686.

The churches of New England, and the North, have had their trials. In my time they have been tried in various ways. The temperance reformation tried them. They have had perils on account of slavery. The Mexican war tried them; the fugitive slave law has put them to the rack. But, never in my day, have the churches been so sorely tried, nor done so well as now. The very letter of the New Testament on the one side, and of the Old Testament on the other, both condemned the law; the spirit of them both was against all slavery.

There are two great sects in Christendom,--the churches of Christianity, and the churches of commerce. The churches of Christianity always do well: they think that religion is love to G.o.d, and love to man. But the churches of commerce, which know no higher law, what should they do?

Some of the ministers of the churches of commerce were wholly silent.

Why so? The poor ministers were very modest all at once. Now, modesty is a commendable virtue; but see how it works. Here is a man who has given his mind ten, twenty, or thirty years to the study of theology, and knows every Hebrew particle of the Old Testament, and every Greek particle of the New Testament, as well as he knows the Lord's Prayer; every great work on the subject of Christianity, from Nicodemus down to Norton. Let him come out and say that the Old Testament was written like other books; let him say that the miracles of the Old and New Testament are like the miracles of the Popish legends; then, ministers in their pulpits, who never studied theology or philosophy, or pretended to study, only to know, the historical development of religion in the world,--they will come down instantly upon our poor man, call his doctrines "false," and call him an "infidel," an "atheist." But let a rich paris.h.i.+oner, or a majority of the rich paris.h.i.+oners, be in favor of the fugitive slave law, and all at once the minister is very modest indeed. He says to his people, by silence or by speech, "I do not understand these things; but you, my people, who all your lives are engaged in making money and nothing else, and wors.h.i.+p mammon and nothing else, you understand them a great deal better than I do. My modesty forbids me to speak. Let us pray!"[31]

Some ministers have been silent; others have spoken out in favor of the lower law, and in derision of the higher law. Here is a famous minister, the very chief of his denomination, reported in the newspapers to have said that he would surrender his own mother to slavery rather than have the Union dissolved! I believe him this time. A few years ago, that minister printed, in the organ of his sect, that the existence of G.o.d was "not a certainty!" He did not mean to say that he doubted or disbelieved it, only that it was "not a certainty!" I should suppose that he had gone further in that direction, and thought the non-existence of G.o.d was "a certainty." But he is not quite original in this proposed sacrifice. He has been preceded and outbid by a Spanish Catholic. Here is the story in Senor de Castro's History of the Spanish Protestants, written this very year. I can tell the story shorter than it is there related. In 1581, there lived a man in Valladolid, who had two Protestant daughters, being himself a Catholic. The Inquisition was in full blast, and its fiery furnace heated seven times hotter than before. This man, according to the commandment of the priests and Pope, complained to the inquisitors against his daughters, who were summoned to appear before them. They were tried, and condemned to be burned alive, at his suggestion. He furnished the accusation, brought forward the evidence, and was the only witness in the case. That was not all.

After this condemnation, he went round his own estates, and from selected trees cut down morsels of wood, and carried them to the city to use in burning his own daughters. He was allowed to do this, and of course the priest commended him for his piety and love of G.o.d! Thus, in 1581, in Valladolid, a father at noon-day, with wood from his own estate, on his own complaint and evidence, with his own hands, burned his two daughters alive; and the Catholic Church said, Well done! Now, in my opinion, the Hidalgo of Valladolid a little surpa.s.ses the Unitarian Doctor of Divinity. I do not know what "recompense of reward"

the Spanish Hidalgo got for his deed; but the American divine, for his offer, has been put into "one of the priests' offices, that he might eat a piece of bread." He has been appointed, as the newspapers say, a Chaplain of the Navy at Was.h.i.+ngton. Verily he has his reward.

But there have been found men in Boston to go a little further. Last Thanksgiving Day, I said it would be difficult to find a magistrate in Boston to take the odium of sending a fugitive back to slavery. I believed, after all, men had some conscience, although they talked about its being a duty to deliver up a man to bondage. Pardon me, my country, that I rated you too high! Pardon me, town of Boston, that I thought your citizens all men! Pardon me, lawyers, that I thought you had been all born of mothers! Pardon me, ruffians, who kill for hire! I thought you had some animal mercy left, even in your bosom! Pardon me, United States' commissioners, marshals, and the like, I thought you all had some shame! Pardon me, my hearers, for such mistakes. One commissioner was found to furnish the warrant! Pardon me, I did not know he was a commissioner; if I had, I never would have said it!

Spirits of tyrants, I look down to you! Shade of Cain, you great first murderer, forgive me that I forgot your power, and did not remember that you were parent of so long a line! And you, my brethren, if hereafter I tell you that there is any limit of meanness or wickedness which a Yankee will not jump over, distrust me, and remind me of this day, and I will take it back!

Let us look at the public conduct of any commissioner who will send an innocent man from Boston into slavery. I would speak of all men charitably; for I know how easy it is to err, yea, to sin. I can look charitably on thieves, prowling about in darkness; on rumsellers, whom poverty compels to crime; on harlots, who do the deed of shame that holy woman's soul abhors and revolts at; I can pity the pirate, who scours the seas doing his fiendish crimes--he is tempted, made desperate by a gradual training in wickedness. The man, born at the South, owning slaves, who goes to Africa and sells adulterated rum in exchange for men to retail at Cuba,--I cannot understand the consciousness of such a man; yet I can admit that by birth and by breeding he has become so imbruted, he knows no better. Nay, even that he may perhaps justify his conduct to himself. I say I think his sin is not so dreadful as that of a commissioner in Boston who sends a man into slavery. A man commits a murder, inflamed by jealousy, goaded by desire of great gain, excited by fear, stung by malice, or poisoned by revenge, and it is a horrid thing.

But to send a man into slavery is worse than to murder him. I should rather be slain than enslaved. To do this, inflamed by no jealousy, goaded by no desire of great gain,--only ten dollars!--excited by no fear, stung by no special malice, poisoned by no revenge,--I cannot comprehend that in any man, not even in a hyena. Beasts that raven for blood do not kill for killing's sake, but to feed their flesh. Forgive me, O ye wolves and hyenas! that I bring you into such company. I can only understand it in a devil!

When a man bred in Ma.s.sachusetts, whose Const.i.tution declares that "All men are born free and equal;" within sight of Faneuil Hall, with all its sacred memories; within two hours of Plymouth Rock; within a single hour of Concord and Lexington; in sight of Bunker Hill,--when he will do such a deed, it seems to me that there is no life of crime long enough to prepare a man for such a pitch of depravity; I should think he must have been begotten in sin, and conceived in iniquity, and been born "with a dog's head on his shoulders;" that the concentration of the villany of whole generations of scoundrels would hardly be enough to fit a man for a deed like this!

You know the story of Thomas Sims. He crept on board a Boston vessel at Savannah. Perhaps he had heard of Boston, nay, even of Faneuil Hall, of the old Cradle of Liberty, and thought this was a Christian town, at least human, and hoped here to enjoy the liberty of a man. When the s.h.i.+p arrived here, the first words he spoke were, "Are we up there?" He was seized by a man who at the court-house boasted of his cruelty towards him, who held him by the hair, and kept him down, seeking to kidnap and carry him back into slavery. He escaped!

But a few weeks pa.s.s by: the man-stealers are here; the commissioner issues his warrant; the marshals serve it in the night. Last Thursday night,--when odious beasts of prey, that dare not face the light of heaven, prowl through the woods,--those ruffians of the law seized on their brother-man. They lie to the bystanders, and seize him on a false pretence. There is their victim--they hold him fast. His faithless knife breaks in his hand; his coat is rent to pieces. He is the slave of Boston.[32] Can you understand his feelings? Let us pa.s.s by that. His "trial!" Shall I speak of that? He has been five days on trial for more than life, and has not seen a judge! A jury? No,--only a commissioner! O justice! O republican America! Is this the liberty of Ma.s.sachusetts?

Where shall I find a parallel with men who will do such a deed,--do it in Boston? I will open the tombs, and bring up most hideous tyrants from the dead. Come, brood of monsters, let me bring you up from the deep d.a.m.nation of the graves wherein your hated memories continue for all time their never-ending rot. Come, birds of evil omen! come, ravens, vultures, carrion-crows, and see the spectacle! come, see the meeting of congenial souls! I will disturb, disquiet, and bring up the greatest monsters of the human race! Tremble not, women; tremble not, children; tremble not, men! They are all dead! They cannot harm you now! Fear the living, not the dead.

Come hither, Herod the wicked. Thou that didst seek after that young child's life, and destroyedst the Innocents! Let me look on thy face!

No; go! Thou wert a heathen! Go, lie with the Innocents thou hast ma.s.sacred. Thou art too good for this company!

Come, Nero! Thou awful Roman Emperor! Come up! No; thou wast drunk with power! schooled in Roman depravity. Thou hadst, besides, the example of thy fancied G.o.ds! Go, wait another day. I will seek a worser man.

Come hither, St. Dominic! come, Torquemada!--Fathers of the Inquisition!

Merciless monsters, seek your equal here! No; pa.s.s by! You are no companions for such men as these! You were the servants of atheistic popes, of cruel kings. Go to, and get you gone. Another time I may have work for you,--not now; lie there and persevere to rot. You are not yet quite wicked and corrupt enough for this comparison. Go, get ye gone, lest the sun turn back at sight of ye!

Come up, thou heap of wickedness, George Jeffries!--thy hands deep purple with the blood of thy murdered fellow men! Ah, I know thee! awful and accursed shade! Two hundred years after thy death, men hate thee still, not without cause! Let me look upon thee! I know thy history.

Pause and be still, while I tell it to these men.

Brothers, George Jeffries "began in the sedition line." "There was no act, however bad, that he would not resort to to get on." "He was of a bold aspect, and cared not for the countenance of any man." "He became the avowed, unblus.h.i.+ng slave of the court, and the bitter persecutor and unappeasable enemy of the principles he had before supported." He "was universally insolent and over-bearing." "As a judge, he did not consider the decencies of his post, nor did he so much as affect to be impartial, as became a judge." His face and voice were always unamiable.

"All tenderness for the feelings of others, all self-respect were obliterated from his mind." He had "a delight in misery, merely as misery," and "that temper which tyrants require in their worst instruments." "He made haste to sell his forehead of bra.s.s and his tongue of venom to the court." He had "more impudence than ten carted street-walkers;" and was appropriately set to a work "which could be trusted to no man who reverenced law, or who was sensible of shame." He was a "Commissioner" in 1685. You know of the "b.l.o.o.d.y a.s.sizes" which he held, and how he sent to execution three hundred and twenty persons in a single circuit. "The whole country was strewed with the heads and limbs of his victims." Yet a man wrote that "A little more hemp might have been usefully employed." He was the worst of the English judges. "There was no measure, however illegal, to the execution of which he did not devotedly and recklessly abandon himself." "During the Stuart reigns, England was cursed by a succession of ruffians in ermine, who, for the sake of court favor, wrested the principles of law, the precepts of religion, and the duties of humanity; but they were all greatly outstripped by Jeffries." Such is his history.

Come, shade of a judicial butcher! Two hundred years thy name has been pilloried in face of the world, and thy memory gibbeted before mankind!

Let us see how thou wilt compare with those who kidnap men in Boston! Go seek companions.h.i.+p with them! Go claim thy kindred, if such they be! Go tell them that the memory of the wicked shall rot,--that there is a G.o.d; an Eternity; ay! and a Judgment too! where the slave may appeal against him that made him a slave, to Him that made him a man.

What! Dost thou shudder? Thou turn back? These not thy kindred! Why dost thou turn pale, as when the crowd clutched at thy life in London Street?

It is true, George Jeffries, and these are not thy kin. Forgive me that I should send thee on such an errand, or bid thee seek companions.h.i.+p with such--with Boston hunters of the slave! Thou wert not base enough!

It was a great bribe that tempted thee! Again I say, pardon me for sending thee to keep company with such men! Thou only struckst at men accused of crime; not at men accused only of their birth! Thou wouldst not send a man into bondage for two pounds! I will not rank thee with men who, in Boston, for ten dollars, would enslave a negro now! Rest still, Herod! Be quiet, Nero! Sleep, St. Dominic, and sleep, O Torquemada! in your fiery jail! Sleep, Jeffries, underneath "the altar of the church" which seeks with Christian charity to hide your hated bones.

"But," asks a looker-on, "What is all this for?" Oh! to save the Union.

"A precious Union which needs a saving such as this! And who are to rend the Union asunder?" Why, men that hate slavery and love freedom for all mankind. "Is this the way to make them love the Union and slavery, and hate freedom for all mankind?" We know none better. "What sort of a measure is this fugitive slave law?" Oh! it is a "peace measure." Don't you see how well it works? how quiet the city? in the country not a mouse stirring? There will not be a word against the peace measure in all New England on this Fast Day. Blessed are the peace-makers, saith Lord! "But you have great warrant for such deeds?" Oh yes, the best in the world,--the example of Was.h.i.+ngton. He also "saved the Union." "So men blaspheme."

Let me tell you a little of that great man. Shortly after the pa.s.sage of the law of 1793, a favorite female slave of Was.h.i.+ngton's wife ran away from the President of the new republic, and went into New Hamps.h.i.+re. She lived at Portsmouth. Was.h.i.+ngton wrote to Mr. Whipple, a United States'

marshal, I think, or, at any rate, an officer of the United States, saying that he should like to have the woman sent back to him, if it could be done without tumult, and without shocking the principles and the feelings of the people. He added that the slave was a favorite of his wife. Mr. Whipple wrote back, and said,--It cannot be done without tumult, nor without shocking the principles and feelings of the people.

Was.h.i.+ngton said no more! The woman died at a great age, a few years ago, at Portsmouth. That was the example of Was.h.i.+ngton,--the man who at his death freed his slaves! Would to G.o.d he had done it before! But they that come at the eleventh hour shall never be cast out from my charity.

See what is the consequence of this measure! See what has been the condition of Boston for the past week! Read the mingled truth and lies in the newspapers; look at men's faces in the street; listen to their talk; see the court-house in chains; see one hundred policemen on guard, and three companies of military picketed in Faneuil Hall; behold the people shut out from the courts--I will not say of justice! See the officers of Ma.s.sachusetts made slave-hunters--against the law; const.i.tutional rights struck down--against the law; sheriffs refusing to serve writs--against the law; see the great civil rights our fathers gained five hundred years ago, the trial by jury, by our "peers," by the "law of the land," all cloven down; the writ of "personal replevin" made null--no sheriff daring to execute a law made to suit such a case as this, made but eight years ago! Where is your high Sheriff? Where is your Governor? See the judges of Ma.s.sachusetts bend beneath that chain; see them bow down, one by one, and kneel, and creep, and cringe, and crouch, and crawl, under the chain! Note the symbol! That was the chain on the neck of the Commonwealth, visible on the necks of the judges as they entered the Bastile of Boston,--the Barrac.o.o.n of Boston! A few years ago, they used to tell us, "Slavery is an abstraction;" "we at the North have nothing to do with it," Now liberty is only an abstraction!

Here is a note just handed me in the pulpit:--

"Marshal Tukey told me this morning, that his orders were _not merely to keep the peace_, but to _a.s.sist the United States' marshal in detaining and transporting the slave_; that he _knew he was violating the State law, as well as I did_; but it was not his responsibility, but that of the Mayor and Aldermen. I thought you might like to know this."

Well, my brethren, I know Boston has seen sad days before now. When the stamp act came here in our fathers' time, it was a sad day; they tolled the bells all over town, and Mayhew wished "they were cut off that trouble you." It was a sad day when the tea came here, although, when it went down the stream, all the hills of New England laughed. And it was a sadder day still, the 17th of June, 1775, when our fathers fought and bled on yonder hill, all red from battle at Concord and Lexington, and poured sheeted death into the ranks of their enemies, while the inhabitants of this town lifted up their hands, but could not go to a.s.sist their brethren in the field; and when, to crown all their sadness, they saw four hundred of the houses of their sister town go up in flames to heaven, and could not lend a helping hand! A sadder day when they fired one hundred guns in Boston for the pa.s.sage of the fugitive slave law. It was the saddest day of all, when a man was kidnapped in Boston by the men of Boston, and your court-house hung with chains.

It was not from the tyrants of the other side of the world that this trouble came!

If you could have seen what I have this morning, at sunrise, one hundred of the police of this city, contrary to the laws of the State, drilling with drawn swords, to learn to guard a man whilst he should be carried into bondage! And who do you suppose was at their head? A man bearing an honorable name--Samuel Adams! Tell it not in Ma.s.sachusetts; let not your children hear of this, lest they curse the mothers that bore them. It is well that we should have a day of fasting and humiliation and prayer, when such things are done here.

Well, my brethren, these are only the beginning of sorrows. There will be other victims yet; this will not settle the question. What shall we do? I think I am a calm man and a cool man, and I have a word or two to say as to what we shall do. Never obey the law. Keep the law of G.o.d.

Next I say, resist not evil with evil; resist not now with violence. Why do I say this? Will you tell me that I am a coward? Perhaps I am; at least I am not afraid to be called one. Why do I say, then, do not now resist with violence? Because it is not time just yet; it would not succeed. If I had the eloquence that I sometimes dream of, which goes into a crowd of men, and gathers it in its mighty arm, and sways them as the pendent boughs of yonder elm shall be shaken by the summer breeze next June, I would not give that counsel. I would call on men, and lift up my voice like a trumpet through the whole land, until I had gathered millions out of the North and the South, and they should crush slavery forever, as the ox crushes the spider underneath his feet. But such eloquence is given to no man. It was not given to the ancient Greek who "shook the a.r.s.enal and fulmined over Greece." He that so often held the n.o.bles and the mob of Rome within his hand, had it not. He that spoke as never man spake, and who has since gathered two hundred millions to his name, had it not. No man has it. The ablest must wait for time! It is idle to resist here and now. It is not the hour. If in 1765 they had attempted to carry out the Revolution by force, they would have failed.

Had it failed, we had not been here to-day. There would have been no little monument at Lexington "sacred to liberty and the rights of mankind," honoring the men who "fell in the cause of G.o.d and their country." No little monument at Concord; nor that tall pile of eloquent stone at Bunker Hill, to proclaim that "Resistance to tyrants is obedience to G.o.d." Success is due to the discretion, heroism, calmness, and forbearance of our fathers: let us wait our time. It will come--perhaps will need no sacrifice of blood.

Resist, then, by peaceful means; not with evil, but with good. Hold the men infamous that execute this law; give them your pity, but never give them your trust, not till they repent. Then swiftly forgive. Agitate, discuss, pet.i.tion, and elect to office men whom you can trust; not men who never show their face in the day of darkness and of peril. Choose men that are men.

I suppose that this man will be carried back to slavery. The law of the United States has been cloven down; the law of Ma.s.sachusetts cloven down. If we have done all that we can we must leave the result to G.o.d.

It is something that a man can only be kidnapped in Boston by riding over the law, and can only be tried in a court-house surrounded by chains, when the crouching judges crawl under the iron of slavery to enter their house of bondage; that even on Fast Day it is guarded by one hundred police, and three companies of military are picketed in Faneuil Hall--the "Sims Brigade!"[33]

The Christians saw Christ crucified, and looked on from afar; sad, but impotent. The Christians at Rome saw their brethren martyred, and could not help them: they were too weak. But the blood of martyrs is the seed of the church. To-day is St. Bademus' Day: three hundred and seventy-six years after Christ, that precious saint was slain because he would not keep the commandment of the king. By crucified redeemers shall mankind be saved. If we cannot prevent crucifixion, let us wait for the redemption.

Shall I ask you to despair of human liberty and rights? I believe that money is to triumph for the present. We see it does in Boston, Philadelphia, New York, and Was.h.i.+ngton: see this in the defence of bribery; in the chains of the court-house; in the judges' pliant necks; in the swords of the police to-day; see it in the threats of the press to withdraw the trade of Boston from towns that favor the unalienable rights of man!

Will the Union hold out? I know not that. But, if men continue to enforce the fugitive slave law, I do not know how soon it will end; I do not care how soon the Union goes to pieces. I believe in Justice and the Law of G.o.d; that ultimately the right will prevail. Wrong will prevail for a time, and attract admiration. I have seen in a haberdasher's shop-window the figure of a wooden woman showily arrayed, turning round on a pivot, and attracting the gaze of all the pa.s.sers-by; but ere long it is forgotten. So it will be with this transient love of slavery in Boston; but the love of right will last as long as the granite in New Hamps.h.i.+re hills. I will not tell you to despair of freedom because politicians are false; they are often so. Despair of freedom for the black man! No, never. Not till heaven shakes down its stars; nay, not till the heart of man ceases to yearn for liberty; not till the eternal G.o.d is hurled from his throne, and a devil takes his place! All the arts of wicked men shall not prevail against the Father; nay, at last, not against the Son.

The very scenes we have witnessed here,--the Court-House in chains,--the Laws of Ma.s.sachusetts despised,--the Commonwealth disgraced,--these speak to the people with an eloquence beyond all power of human speech.

Here is great argument for our cause. This work begets new foes to every form of wrong. There is a day after to-day,--an eternity after to-morrow. Let us be courageous and active, but cool and tranquil, and full of hope.

These are the beginning of sorrows; we shall have others, and trials.

Continued material prosperity is commonly bad for a man, always for a nation. I think the time is coming when there will be a terrible contest between liberty and slavery. Now is the time to spread ideas, not to bear arms. I know which will triumph: the present love of thraldom is only an eddy in the great river of the nation's life; by and by it will pa.s.s down the stream and be forgot. Liberty will spread with us, as the spring over the New England hills. One spot will blossom, and then another, until at last the spring has covered the whole land, and every mountain rejoices in its verdant splendor.

O Boston! thou wert once the prayer and pride of all New England men, and holy hands were laid in baptism on thy baby brow! Thou art dishonored now; thou hast taken to thy arms the enemies of men. Thou hast betrayed the slave; thy brother's blood cries out against thee from the ground. Thou art a stealer of mankind. In thy borders, for long years, the Cradle of Liberty has been placed. The golden serpent of commerce has twined its snaky folds about it all, and fascinated into sleep the child. Tread lightly, soldiers: he yet may wake. Yes, in his time this child shall wake, and Boston shall scourge out the memory of the men who have trodden her laws under foot, violated the dearest instincts of her heart, and profaned her religion. I appeal from Boston, swollen with wealth, drunk with pa.s.sion, and mad against freedom--to Boston in her calm and sober hour.

O Ma.s.sachusetts, n.o.ble State, the mother that bore us all; parent of goodly inst.i.tutions and of n.o.ble men, whose great ideas have blessed the land!--how art thou denied, dishonored, and brought low! One of thine own hired servants has wrought this deed of shame, and rent the bosom which took him as an adopted son. Shall it be always thus? I conjure thee by all thy battle-fields,--by the remembrance of the great men born of thee, who battled for the right, thy Franklin, Hanc.o.c.k, the Adamses--three in a single name,--by thine ideas and thy love of G.o.d,--to forbid forever all such deeds as this, and wipe away thy deep disgrace.