now, as we could not have talked a dozen years ago. I want the whole of
the London ministry to meet Douglass. For as his appeal is to England,
and throughout England, I should rejoice in the idea of churchmen and
dissenters merging all sectional distinctions in this cause. Let us have
a public breakfast. Let the ministers meet him; let them hear him; let
them grasp his hand; and let him enlist their sympathies on behalf of
the slave. Let him inspire them with abhorrence of the man-stealer--the
slaveholder. No slaveholding American shall ever my cross my door.
No slaveholding or slavery-supporting minister shall ever pollute my
pulpit. While I have a tongue to speak, or a hand to write, I will,
to the utmost of my power, oppose these slaveholding men. We must have
Douglass amongst us to aid in fostering public opinion.

The great conflict with slavery must now take place in America; and{329}
while they are adding other slave states to the Union, our business
is to step forward and help the abolitionists there. It is a pleasing
circumstance that such a body of men has risen in America, and whilst we
hurl our thunders against her slavers, let us make a distinction between
those who advocate slavery and those who oppose it. George Thompson has
been there. This man, Frederick Douglass, has been there, and has been
compelled to flee. I wish, when he first set foot on our shores, he had
made a solemn vow, and said, "Now that I am free, and in the sanctuary
of freedom, I will never return till I have seen the emancipation of my
country completed." He wants to surround these men, the slaveholders,
as by a wall of fire; and he himself may do much toward kindling it.
Let him travel over the island--east, west, north, and south--everywhere
diffusing knowledge and awakening principle, till the whole nation
become a body of petitioners to America. He will, he must, do it. He
must for a season make England his home. He must send for his wife. He
must send for his children. I want to see the sons and daughters of
such a sire. We, too, must do something for him and them worthy of the
English name. I do not like the idea of a man of such mental dimensions,
such moral courage, and all but incomparable talent, having his own
small wants, and the wants of a distant wife and children, supplied by
the poor profits of his publication, the sketch of his life. Let the
pamphlet be bought by tens of thousands. But we will do something more
for hi