Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1854-06-08

A Sc r M ON,
BY T. w. Higginson, Minister Of the
Worcester f ee Church
Jer. XVI, 12-shau the iron break the Northern iron
/ and the steel'
You have imagined my subject beforehand,
| for there is but one subject on which | could
preach, or you could listen, to-day. Yet, how
hard it is to say one word OF that Y GU do
notask, at a funeral, that the bereaved mourn
ers themselves should speak, but YOU call in
one little farther removed, to utter words of
comfort, if comfort there be. But to-day is,
or should be, to every congregation in Mas
sachusetts, day of funeral service-we are
all mourners-and what is there for me to
say.
Yet, even in this gloom, the faculty Of
wonder is left; as at funerals, men ask in
low tone, around the coffin, what was the
disease that smote this fair form, and are we
safe from the infection? So we now AK,
what is lost, and how have we lost it, and
I what have we left Is it all gone, (rnen saw
that old New England heroism and enthusi-
asns Is there any disinterested love of Free
dom left in Massachusetts? And then they
think with joy, Gas | do,] that, at least Free
| dom did not die without a struggle, and that
| it took thousands of armed men to Law her in
| the grave at last.
l am thankful for all this. Words are
nothing---we have been surfeited with words
for twenty years. l am thankful that this
time there was action also ready for Freedom.
God gave men bodies, to live and work in;
the powers Of those bodies are the first things
to be consecrated to the Right. He gave us
higher powers, also, for weapons, but in
using those, we must not forget to hold the
lower ones also ready; else we miss our prop
er manly life on earth, aud lay down our
means of usefulness before we have outgrown
| them. " Render unto Caesar the things which
| are Caesars, and unto God the things that
are Gods Our souls and bodies are both
Gods, and resistance to tyrants is obedience
to Him.
II you meet men whose souls are contami-
mated, and have time enough to work on
them, you can deal with them by the weap-
Gus Of the soul alone but if men array brute
force against Freedom-pistols clubs, drilled
soldiers, aud stone walls-then the body also
has its part to do IN resistance. You must
hold yourself above men, l own, yet not too
far above to reach them.
/ don't like even to think of taking life, only
of giving it; but physical force that is forcible
enough, acts without bloodshed. They say
that with twenty more men at hand, that Fri
day night, at the Boston Court House, the
slave might have been rescued without even
the death of that one man-who was perhaps
killed by his frightened companions then and
there. SO you see, force may not mean blood
she'd; and calm irresistible force, in good
cause, becomes sublime. The strokes on the
door of that Court House that night for in
stance-they may perchance have disturbed
some dreamy saint from his meditations (if
dreamy saints abound in Court Square)-but
think they went echoing from town to town,
| from Boston to far New Orleans, like the first
drum beat of tie Revolution-and each reyer-
| berating throb blow upon the door of
| every slave prison Of this guilty Republic.
That first faint throb of Liberty was proud
thing for Boston; Boston which was a scene
so funereal week after. Men say the act of
one Friday helped prepare for the next; l am
glad if it did If the attack on the Court
House had no greater effect than to send that
slave away under guard of two thousand
men, instead of two hundred, it was worth a
| dozen lives. If we are all slaves indeed-if
there is no law in Massachusetts except the
! Geographic order from Westinghouse our
| own military TO be made slave-catchers-
if our Governor is a mere piece of state cere-
mony, permitted only to rise at a military dim
ner and thank his own soldiers for their read
mess to shoot down his own constituents.
without even the delay of a riot act-if Mas
sachusetts is merely conquered province and
under martial law-then 1 irish to kgaoso it, ami
| am grateful for every additional gun and
sabre, that forces the truth deeper into our
hearts. Loseer Massachusetts,, foaoer, k,aeeS
lower StiUi Serve Irish Marines the kid
nappers, your masters ;--down in the dust,
citizen soldiery before the Irish Marines,
and for you, 0 Governor, a lower humility vet
and your homage must be paid, at second
hand, before the stained and soiled citizen
soldiory I"
l remember the great trades procession in
Boston, a few years since, in honor of the WIS.,
itors from the North, from the free soil Of
Canada. Then all choice implements, which
Massachusetts, had invented to supply the in
dustry of the world were brought forth tor
exhibition, and superb was the show This
time we had visitors from the South-the
South which uses tools also, and imports them
all, hoes, spades, axes, politicians, and minis
tiers. So the last new implements, for her use,
were to be exhibited now. There were TWEEN
ty- one specimens of Boston military compa-
MES. There were the two hundred more con-
identia DULLES, for whom the city was ram
sacked men so vile, that it was said the police
had no duties left, for all the dangerous per-
sons were employed as policemen themselves,
men whom Police Judge having inspect
ed, recognized criminal after criminal, who
had been sentenced by himself to the House
OF C0rreeJlOn5 bneSe came next. Truly as
there is Joy in Heaven oyer one sinner who
repenteth, so there was joy in Boston that
day, over one sinner who had not repented,---
over every man in whom the powers of hell
were strong enough, aided by public brandy.
to fit him for that terrible service. Those
were the tools marshalled forth for exhibition.
But why were these only shown Why were
the finer, the more precious implements kept
invisible that day, the real engines of that
Shareholders triumph: Why not make the
picture perfect: Place, 0 Chief Marshal,
between the slave and the guardian cannon,
the browning glory of that sad procession, the
Shareholder in his carriage, and chain, on the
one side, the Mayor of Boston. and, on the
other side, the Governor Of the Common
acealth with the motto, "Fhe Representative
Men of Massachusetts, These tools she gives,
Virginid, to thee =
l mean no personality. The mon who oc-
cupy these offices, are men who Il have al
ways thought) did them honor / suppose
that neither would own slave,nor personal
ly) catch one No doubt they iavorably rep
resent the average of Massachusetts men.
But Introduce then, for precisely THIS reason,
to show the tragedy OF our American nstitn-
tons, that they take average Massachusetts
men, put them into public Office and then,
demanding more OF them than their educa-
ton gives them inanliness to meet, use them.
crush them, and drop them, into the dishonor
with which these hitherto honored men are