In
attacking it, we did not measure our words. "It is," said Garrison,
"a waste of politeness to be courteous to the devil." But in truth the
contest was, in a great measure, an impersonal one,--hatred of slavery
and not of slave-masters.
"No common wrong provoked our zeal,
The silken gauntlet which is thrown
In such a quarrel rings like steel."
Even Thomas Jefferson, in his terrible denunciation of Slavery in the
Notes on Virginia, says "It is impossible to be temperate and pursue the
subject of Slavery." After the great contest was over, no class of the
American people were more ready, with kind words and deprecation of
harsh retaliation, to welcome back the revolted States than the
Abolitionists; and none have since more heartily rejoiced at the fast
increasing prosperity of the South.
Grateful for the measure of favor which has been accorded to my
writings, I leave this edition with the public. It contains all that I
care to re-publish, and some things which, had the matter of choice been
left solely to myself, I should have omitted.
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