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

[148] your mind to those subjects. Allow me to suggest that you will set Anti-slavery in the sunshine only by making it tributary to Holiness; and you will most assuredly throw it into the shade which now covers Colonization if you suffer it to occupy the ground, in your own mind or in others, which ought to be occupied by Universal emancipation from sin. All the abhorrence which now falls upon slavery, intemperance, lewdness, and every other specific vice, will in due time be gathered into one volume of victorious wrath against unbelief. I wait for that time as for the day of battle, regarding all the previous movements as only fencing-schools and manoeuvres of military discipline—or at best as the preliminary skirmishes which precede a general engagement. I counsel you, and the people that are with you, if you love the post of honor—the forefront of the hottest battle of righteousness—to set your face toward perfect holiness. Your station is one that gives you power over the nations. Your city is on a high hill. If you plant the standard of perfect holiness where you stand, many will see and flow to it. I judge from my own experience that you will be deserted by many of your present friends; but you will be deserted as Jonah was by the whale—the world, in vomiting you up, will heave you upon the dry land. . . .

We see the working of this communication in the following letter written a few weeks later:

W. L. Garrison to Henry C. Wright, in New York.

Boston, April 16, 1837.

¹ It is a great disappointment to me to hear that dear bro. Weld will be absent from New York during the anniversary² week. We need the aid of his sagacious, far-reaching, active mind on that occasion; yet I grant that the preservation of his health and life is of more consequence. May he obtain a speedy restoration, and be more provident of his bodily energies in time to come! I long to know that he has embraced our ultra pacific views, and is ready to stand boldly forth in their defence. You cheer my heart by the information that our beloved sisters, Sarah and Angelina E. Grimke, are now satisfied that the followers of Him who, when he was reviled, reviled not again, and, when nailed to the cross, exclaimed respecting his murderous enemies, ‘Father, forgive them, they know not what they do!’ are not authorized to combine