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of any party, sect, or profession.
That way ruin lies.
The chiefest bulwark against it I know of is the Liberator. Success to it. May it have the cordial support of every abolition heart.
Such a testimonial from such a source was discouraging enough; but fairly startling was
Mr. Garrison's article, ‘Watchman, What of the Night?’
in the adjoining column.
This abruptly declared the approaching annual meeting to be ‘pregnant with momentous consequences to the abolition cause in this section of the country.’
Never, perhaps, was there greater cause for alarm.
‘Strong foes are without, insidious plotters are within the camp.’
The foes without were political.
The Democratic party being hopelessly given over to the defence of slavery and the denial of free speech, the
Whigs were cherishing the hope, by a display of courtesy and even liberality towards the abolitionists, of bringing these under their control and management:
But all external opposition, in whatever form it may appear,1 is harmless, compared to internal sedition.
And with pain we avow it, there is a deep scheme laid by individuals at present somewhat conspicuous as zealous and active abolitionists, to put the control of the anti-slavery movement in this Commonwealth into other hands.
This scheme, of course, is of clerical origin, and the prominent ringleaders fill the clerical office.
One of the most restless was a participant in the infamous “Clerical Appeal” conspiracy, though not one of the immortal five.
The design is, by previous management and drilling, to effect such a change in the present faithful and liberal-minded Board of Managers of the State Society, at the annual meeting, as will throw the balance of power into the hands of a far different body of men, for the accomplishment of ulterior measures which are now in embryo.
The next object is, to effect the establishment of a new weekly anti-slavery journal, to be the organ of the State Society, for the purpose, if not avowedly, yet designedly, to subvert the Liberator, and thus relieve the abolition cause in this State of the odium of countenancing such a paper.
Then——make way for the clergy!
For, by “hanging Garrison” and repudiating the Liberator, they will surely condescend to take the reins of anti-slavery management into their own hands!
