Page:The Natick resolution, or, resistance to slaveholders.djvu/37

Rh flag floats over her citadels of power in the four quarters of the globe, and upon every sea. But, sir, I honor the friends of liberty and progress in England, whose efforts for the last thirty years, in the cause of human progress, have never been surpassed by the efforts of any class of men in any portion of the civilized world. [Hear! hear!] Yes, sir, I undertake to say here, to-night, that in no part of the world, and in no age of the world, and by no race in the world, have greater efforts been made for human progress and human liberty, than have been made during the last thirty years in Old England. [Applause.] Her reformers have achieved the most brilliant victories. Among all her brilliant intellects, who have linked their names with the great ideas of Progress, no name shines more brightly than the name of George Thompson. [Applause.] As an American, loving the good name of my native land, jealous of its honor and its fame, I have felt the deepest mortification, that in the city of Boston, in old Faneuil Hall, the man who has stood up fearlessly in England and supported American principles, and defended the American name, should be received by men, calling themselves American Democrats, with ridicule and denunciations. [Applause.] His name is indissolubly linked with those great measures of reform which have for their object the elevation and improvement of the people of England. His voice has been raised in behalf of the millions of British India; and for West India emancipation,—the noblest act in the annals of British history,—his labors were freely given. His labors have been such, since he left our shores fifteen years ago, as should have given him, in Faneuil Hall and every where, a warm and hearty welcome. [Applause.] And, sir, as an American, loving my country, cherishing the great fundamental principles on which its institutions are founded, I come here to-night, and give him the same cordial welcome to America, that I would extend to the men who have nobly struggled on the lost fields where Liberty has been cloven down. [Sensation.] And as he may be called upon in a few months to leave us, I trust that when he goes, there will be none, at least in Massachusetts, who will censure him for laboring to blot from our country the sin and shame of slavery. [Much enthusiasm.]