John Jay Chapman, William Lloyd Garrison

“ [84] statesmen might exhibit. But the scholars, the statesmen, the clergy had done nothing, --did not seem about to do anything; and for my part I thank God that at last any persons, be they who they may, have earnestly engaged in this cause; for no movement can be in vain. We Abolitionists are what we are-babes, sucklings, obscure men, silly women, publicans, sinners, and we shall manage this matter just as might be expected of such persons as we are. It is unbecoming in abler men who stood by and would do nothing to complain of us because we do no better.”

“Dr. Channing,” I continued with increased earnestness, “it is not our fault that those who might have conducted this great reform more prudently have left it to us to manage as we may. It is not our fault that those who might have pleaded for the enslaved so much more wisely and eloquently, both with the pen and the living voice, than we can, have been silent. We are not to blame, sir, that you, who, more perhaps than any other man, might have so raised the voice of remonstrance that it should have been heard throughout the length and breadth of the land-we are not to blame, sir, that you have not so ”