Francis Jackson Garrison, William Lloyd Garrison, 1805-1879; the story of his life told by his children: volume 1

[126] Church to hear the address—a thing that he has not done for many years.

I expect to get a journeyman's berth immediately after the 4th; but, if I do not, I shall take the stage for Newburyport, and dig on at the case for Mr. Allen. I am somewhat in a hobble, in a pecuniary point of view, and must work like a tiger. My fingers have not lost their nimbleness, and my pride I have sent on a pilgrimage to Mecca.

By answering this on Tuesday, by the driver, you will confer another obligation on

Yours, with much affection,

Wm. Lloyd Garrison.

Direct to me at No. 30, Federal-St., Boston.

It is to be presumed that the desired loan was promptly made, for at four o'clock on the afternoon of July 4, Mr. Garrison rose to address an audience which filled Park-Street Church and included Whittier, Goodell, and John Pierpont, whose spirited hymn (‘With thy pure dews and rains’) was ready for the occasion. It was sung now under the direction of Lowell Mason; and was heard afterwards at many an anti-slavery meeting during the¹ thirty years conflict, besides being included in some church hymnals, in which the following stinging verses must have made it especially serviceable and effective:

Hearest thou, O God, those chains,
     Clanking on Freedom's plains,
By Christians wrought!
     Them who those chains have worn,
Christians from home have torn,
     Christians have hither borne,
Christians have bought!

Cast down, great God, the fanes
     That, to unhallowed gains,
Round us have risen—
     Temples whose priesthood pore
Moses and Jesus o'er,
     Then bolt the black man's door,
The poor man's prison!