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[174]

Most happy am I to be no longer in conflict with the mass of my fellow-countrymen on the subject of slavery. For no man of any refinement or sensibility can be indifferent to the approbation of his fellow-men, if it be rightly earned. But to obtain it by going with the multitude to do evil—by pandering to despotic power or a corrupt public sentiment—is self-degradation and personal dishonor:

For more true joy Marcellus exiled feels
Than Caesar with a Senate at his heels.

Better to be always in a minority of one with God—branded as madman, incendiary, fanatic, heretic, infidel—frowned upon by ‘the powers that be,’ and mobbed by the populace—or consigned ignominiously to the gallows, like him whose soul is marching on, John Brown. though his ‘body lies mouldering in the grave,’ or burnt to ashes at the stake like Wickliffe, or nailed to the cross like him who ‘gave himself for the world,’—in defence of the right, than like Herod, having the shouts of a multitude crying, ‘It is the voice of a god, and not of a man!’

Farewell, tried and faithful patrons! Farewell, generous benefactors, without whose voluntary but essential pecuniary contributions the Liberator must have long since been discontinued! Farewell, noble men and women who have wrought so long and so successfully, under God, to break every yoke! Hail, ye ransomed millions! Hail, year of jubilee! With a grateful heart and a fresh baptism of the soul, my last invocation shall be:

Spirit of Freedom, on!—
     Oh! pause not in thy flight
Till every clime is won
     To worship in thy light:
Speed on thy glorious way,
     And wake the sleeping lands!
Millions are watching for the ray,
     And lift to thee their hands.
Still “Onward!” be thy cry—
     Thy banner on the blast;
And, like a tempest, as thou rushest by,
     Despots shall shrink aghast.
On! till thy name is known
     Throughout the peopled earth;
On! till thou reign'st alone,
     Man's heritage by birth;
On! till from every vale, and where the mountains rise,
     The beacon lights of Liberty shall kindle to the skies!

Wm. Lloyd Garrison. Boston, December 29, 1865.

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