Lydia Maria Child, Letters of Lydia Maria Child
John Greenleaf Whittier, Wendell Phillips, Harriet Winslow Sewall, Ed.

To Miss Henrietta Sargent.

I found the reverend Doctor walking down Mount Vernon Street, but lie insisted so strongly upon going back, that I at last consented. He was very kind and complimentary, in manners and conversation. He soon began to talk of anti-slavery. I could see that he had progressed (as we Yankees say) considerably since I last conversed with him; but he still betrayed his characteristic timidity. Almost every sentence began with, “I am doubtful,” or “I am afraid.” Tie was “doubtful” of the policy of sending out seventy agents. He was “afraid” there would be among them some indifferent men. I told him that they gave pretty good evidence they were not indifferent to the cause. He did not mean that, he meant there would be some among them of indifferent intellectual and moral gifts. I urged that their willingness to go was strong presumptive evidence in favor of their moral character; and expressed a reasonable doubt whether the seventy sent out by the apostles were all equally gifted. He replied, “But they went out on a very simple errand.” I rejoined, “And the abolitionists go out on a very simple errand. Their principles are a resuscitation of doctrines preached by the apostolic seventy.” He admitted that the foundation principles of Christianity and abolition were identical; but still this subject was so intertwisted with politics, prejudice, and interest, and the manner of illustrating it might be so injudicious, that he thought it every way desirable