Xxxi.
And now, sir, I present to you the Anti-Slavery Enterprise vindicated in Necessity, Practicability and Dignity, against all objections. If there be any objection which I have not answered, it is because I am not aware of its existence. It remains that I should give a practical conclusion to this whole matter, by showing, though in glimpses only, your special duties as freemen of the North. And, thank God! at last there is a North. Mr. President, it is not uncommon to hear persons among us at the North, confess the wrong of Slavery, and then, folding their hands in absolute listlessness, ejaculate, ‘What can we do about it?’ Such men we encounter daily. You all know them. Among them are men in every department of human activity—who perpetually buy, build and plan—who shrink from no labor—who are daunted by no peril of commercial adventure, by no hardihood of industrial enterprise—who, reaching in their undertakings across oceans and continents, would undertake ‘to put a girdle about the earth in forty seconds;’ and yet, disheartened, they can join in no effort against Slavery. Others there are, especially among the youthful and enthusiastic, who vainly sigh because they were not born in the age of chivalry, or at least in the days of the revolution, not thinking that in this Enterprise there is an opportunity of lofty endeavor such as no Paladin of chivalry, or chief of the revolution enjoyed. Others there are, who freely bestow their means and time upon the distant inaccessible heathen of another hemisphere, in the islands of the sea; and yet they can do nothing to mitigate our grander heathenism here at home. While confessing that it ought to disappear from the earth, they forego, renounce and abandon all exertion [191] against it. Others there are still, (such is human inconsistency!) who plant the tree in whose full-grown shade they can never expect to sit—who hopefully drop the acorn in the earth, trusting that the oak which it sends upwards to the skies will shelter their children beneath its shade; but they will do nothing to plant or nurture the great tree of Liberty, that it may cover with its arms unborn generations of men. Others still there are, particularly in the large cities, who content themselves by occasional contributions to the redemption of a slave. To this object they give out of ample riches, and thus seek to silence the monitions of conscience. Now, I would not discountenance any form of activity by which Human Freedom, even in a single case, may be secured. But I desire to say, that such an act—too often accompanied by a pharisaical pretension, in strange contrast with the petty performance—cannot be considered an essential aid to the Anti-Slavery Enterprise. Not in this way can any impression be made on an evil so vast as Slavery—as you will clearly see by an illustration which I shall give. The god Thor, of Scandinavian mythology—whose strength surpassed that of Hercules—was once challenged to drain a simple cup dry. He applied it to his lips, and with superhuman capacity drank, but the water did not recede even from the rim, and at last the god abandoned the effort. The failure of even his extraordinary strength was explained, when he learned that the simple cup had communicated, by an invisible connection, with the whole vast ocean behind, out of which it was perpetually supplied, and which remained absolutely unaffected by the effort. And just so will these occasions of charity, though encountered by the largest private means, be constantly renewed, for they communicate with the whole Black Sea of Slavery behind, out of which they are perpetually supplied, and which remains absolutely unaffected by the effort. Sir, private means may cope with individual necessities, but they are powerless to redress the evils of a wicked institution. Charity is limited and local; the evils of Slavery are infinite and everywhere. Besides, a wrong organized and upheld by law, can be removed only through a change of the law. Not, then, by an occasional contribution to ransom a slave can your duty be done in this great cause; but only by earnest, constant, valiant efforts against the institution—against the law—which makes slaves. I am not insensible to the difficulties of this work. Full well I know the power of Slavery. Full well I know all its various intrenchments in the Church, the politics and the prejudices of the country. Full well I know the sensitive interests of property, amounting to many hundred [192] millions of dollars, which are said to be at stake. But these things can furnish no motive or apology for indifference, or for any folding of the hands. Surely the wrong is not less wrong because it is gigantic; the evil is not less evil because it is immeasurable; nor can the duty of perpetual warfare with wrong or evil be in this instance suspended. Nay, because Slavery is powerful—because the Enterprise is difficult—therefore is the duty of all more exigent. The well-tempered soul does not yield to difficulties, but presses onward forever with increased resolution. And here the question occurs, which is so often pressed in argument, or in taunt, What have we at the North to do with Slavery? In answer, I might content myself by saying that as members of the human family, bound together by the cords of a common manhood, there is no human wrong to which we can justly be insensible, nor is there any human sorrow which we should not seek to relieve; but I prefer to say, on this occasion, that, as citizens of the United States, anxious for the good name, the repose and the prosperity of the Republic—that it may be a blessing and not a curse to mankind—there is nothing among all its diversified interests, under the National Constitution, with which, at this moment, we have so much to do; nor is there anything with regard to which our duties are so irresistibly clear. I do not dwell on the scandal of Slavery in the national capital–of Slavery in the national territories—of the coast-wise slave-trade on the high seas beneath the national flag,—all of which are outside of State limits, and within the exclusive jurisdiction of Congress, where you and I, sir, and every freeman of the North, are compelled to share the responsibility and help to bind the chain. To dislodge Slavery from these usurped footholds under the Constitution, and thus at once to relieve ourselves from a grievous responsibility, and to begin the great work of emancipation, were an object worthy of an exalted ambition. But before even this can be commenced, there is a great work, more than any other important and urgent, which must be consummated in the domain of national politics, and also here at home in the Free States. The National Government itself must be emancipated, so that it shall no longer wear the yoke of servitude; and Slavery in all its pretensions must be dislodged from its usurped foothold, in the Free States themselves, thus relieving ourselves from a grievous responsibility at our own door, and emancipating the North. Emancipation, even within the national jurisdiction, can be achieved only through the emancipation of the Free States, accompanied by the complete emancipation of the National Government. [193] Ay, sir, emancipation at the South can be reached only through the emancipation of the North. And this is my answer to the interrogatory: What have we at the North to do with Slavery?
