Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Politics volume 4 .djvu/308

296 honoured it. The hall rang with applause when he invented a Bible to suppress discussion. Since that time he has had his reward: he is a judge of the Court of the United States.

It is not twenty-one years since a mob of well-dressed "gentlemen of property and standing," in this very city, broke up a prayer-meeting of women, where a Quaker lady presided, because they came together to discuss slavery. It is not quite twenty-one years since the great advocate of freedom for all men was forced to take shelter in the stone gaol of Boston, to secure him from the fury of a mob,—the only place in Boston where he could be secure from the hands of the property, the education, the fashion, the respectability, of this town. It is not twenty-one years since, at night, a gallows was erected before his house, with an appropriate motto on it, meaning, "If you don't hold your peace, we will take your life!" You know what insults, private as well as public, were heaped upon Dr. Channing, as soon as he spoke in behalf of freedom. He lost his influence; he hurt his reputation. If a minister said a word in behalf of the slave, that minister was an object of scorn in his own parish, and in the whole town also. No man took an interest in promoting the cause of humanity but he lost all his "respectability." Personal qualities stood him in no stead ; birth from a distinguished line was of no consequence; even money did not save him. "Decency" dropped him out of its ranks. Freedom of speech was assaulted with violence in Boston long before the experiment was tried on the senatorial head of Mr. Sumner. Mr. Brooks, in Washington, only does in 1856, what Mr. Sprague, in Boston, encouraged twenty years before,—puts down discussion.

When the Slave Power wanted Texas annexed, to spread bondage over two hundred and thirty-seven thousand square miles of land, the controlling men of Boston were anxious for that measure. Even the indignant voice of Mr. Webster could not make a public opinion against that extension of wickedness. "However bounded" was the cry!

When the Mexican War broke out, by the act of the slave despotism, how feebly did Boston oppose the crime! Nay, its representative voted for the war and the falsehood