Francis Jackson Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison, 1805-1879; the story of his life told by his children: volume 2

[114] close of the present volume; and all appeals for aid in its behalf will be less likely to prevail than formerly. I am conscious that a mighty sectarian conspiracy is forming to crush me, and it will probably succeed, to some extent. Well—from the heart I can say, “The Lord is my portion—I will not fear what men can do unto me.” O, the rottenness of Christendom! Judaism and Romanism are the leading features of Protestantism.¹ I am forced to believe, that, as it respects the greater portion of professing Christians in this land, Christ has died in vain. In their traditions, their forms and ceremonies, their vain janglings, their self-righteousness, their will-worship, their sectarian zeal and devotion, their infallibility and exclusiveness, they are Pharisees and Sadducees, they are Papists and Jews. Blessed be God that I am not entangled with their yoke of bondage, and that I am not allied to them in spirit or form.

In the anti-slavery propagandism of the year, the chief event is thus referred to in the Liberator of November 5, 1836: ‘Not less than seventy Agents have lately been² engaged, and are shortly to go forth, in the anti-slavery cause—some “during the war,” and others for a definite period of action.’ The prospect inspired Mrs. Chapman to address them in her refined verse, full of ardor; and³ the occasion of their protracted meeting in New York for⁴ instructions, prior to their dispersion in apostolic service, seemed a proper one for Mr. Garrison's presence and counsel:

W. L. Garrison to Henry E. Benson, at Brooklyn, Conn.

Boston, December 3, 1836.

⁵ My wife, I suppose, has written Anna an account of our trip⁶ New York—a city which she had long been wishing to see, not because ‘five thousand gentlemen of property and standing,’ as in Boston, once turned out to mob her husband, (you remember the uproar in October, 1833,)—for she declares that⁷ she loves me dearly, and if you will not doubt her word I will not, —but because it is the capital city of America, and swarming,