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[132] different camp. Nevertheless, in the early days of January, 1837, while the fate of the Liberator hung trembling in the balance, that clergyman issued a pamphlet letter to J. G. Birney, written in the previous November on1 occasion of the destruction of the Philanthropist, in which he virtually singled out the elder paper for condemnation. His language, it is true, was general, and applied to the abolitionists ‘in the main’: ‘Their writings have been blemished by a spirit of intolerance, sweeping censure, and rash, injurious judgment.’ But when he expressly made an ‘honorable exception’ of the Philanthropist,2 and of other publications within his knowledge, any one could read Garrison and the Liberator between the lines. And yet this letter was ostensibly, and primarily in its author's intent, a vindication of abolitionists against persecution; an act of personal gratitude for their sufferings in defence of the liberty of thought, speech, and of the press; an explicit endorsement of their eminent blamelessness of character, and disposition ‘to adopt a rigid construction of the Christian precepts.’ It first appeared in the Philanthropist, from which it was copied into the Liberator, with the3 editor's customary tolerance for the views of critics and opponents, and with the editorial comment: ‘A million4 letters like this would never emancipate a single slave, but rather rivet his fetters more strongly.’ When the letter took the shape of a pamphlet, it was furnished with an appendix, embracing fresh censure of the 5 aboli

1 Ante, p. 98.

2 Birney disclaimed the compliment. ‘Our country was asleep, whilst slavery was preparing to pour its “leprous distilment” into her ears. So deep was becoming her sleep that nothing but a rude and almost ruffianlike shake could rouse her to a contemplation of her danger. If she is saved, it is because she has been thus treated’ (Lib. 7.2). But Channing took the professional clerical view of the matter, as was shown two years later by an eminent Congregational clergyman, the Rev. Horace Bushnell, of Hartford, in a discourse on slavery. ‘The first movement here at the North,’ said he, ‘was a rank onset and explosion. . . . The first sin of this organization was a sin of ill-manners. They did not go to work like Christian gentlemen. . . . The great convention which met at Philadelphia, drew up a declaration of their sentiments . . . by which they wilfully and boorishly cast off the whole South from them’ (Lib. 9.29).

3 Lib. 7.1.

4 Lib. 7.3.

5 Lib. 7.11.

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