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

There was a familiar echo, in this tenor, of the coarse abusiveness of the Rev. James T. Woodbury on behalf¹ of the Appeal. It was distinctively a clerical facon de parler, in which the haughtiness of the cloth was unmistakable. We meet with it constantly in the discussion which raged during the ensuing months. The Rev. John Le Bosquet, writing to the Herald of Freedom in protest² against the high estimation of Mr. Garrison among abolitionists, calls it ‘Idolatry—the worship of another being than Jehovah’; speaks of him as the ‘All in All of the affections of the anti-slavery host,’ though aiming to ‘overthrow all government, even that of Jehovah,’ and ‘make himself the Universal Lord, and make all men slaves to him’; and ‘either so elated with his elevation as to think that he was “monarch of all he surveyed,” and therefore could successfully combat the armies of heaven and earth, or so enraged because he could not connect to his faith all the ministers and churches in the world in a moment, as to be induced to turn his weapons against their religion.’ In the same spirit, the Rev. Daniel Wise, of Quincy, reported Mr.³ Garrison to have spoken (at the quarterly meeting) ‘as if he were whip-master-general and supreme judge of all abolitionists; as though he wore the triple crown, and wielded an irresponsible sceptre over all the embattled hosts of anti-slavery troops.’ And even the Rev. George Allen, of Shrewsbury, declared Mr. Garrison resolved⁴ ‘to cripple the influence of all who will not come under the yoke which he has bent for their necks.’

The annual meeting was held on January 23, in the⁵ Marlboroa Chapel, with Francis Jackson in the chair. ‘It was the largest anti-slavery gathering ever witnessed in⁶ Massachusetts,’ and the interest in the proceedings was most intense. The dissidents were there in full force, though in a meagre minority, and consumed a ⁷ dispro