Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1909-07-03
JOHN woOLMAN.
Reused Society of Friends in opposi-
ton to Slavery.


! From the New York World.
| The resurrection OF John woolman by
/ DIR. Eliot came as a surprise to many
, ordinarily we'll read persons Here was a
real literary mystery to battle them Be-
cause they could not solve it offhand they
felt an increased contempt for the amaz-
| ing selection of works that encompassed
the essentials OF liberal education with
in a five-foot shelf. Yet only a passing
| acquaintance with Whittier's writings
should have reminded them that The
Journal of John Woolman," as published
| in 1871. with an Introduction by the
Quaker poet, had Wide circulation.
John Woolman is entitled by right to II
secure place among early American
| in Burlington cout ~ In what was then
called West Jersey, he grew TO manhood
| in a settlement almost entirely peopled
with Quakers. In his twenty-first year.
as he relates in his journal. he was en-
gagged with man al Mount Holly in
much business as shopkeeper and baker
TO tend shops and keep books His
master sold a negro woman to Quaker
neighbor and requested the young man to
make a bill of sale Of her. He yielded,
but. he wrote later. lat the executing
| of it was SO afflicted IN my mind that l
said before my master and the Friend
! that I believed slave-keeping to be a
practice inconsistent with the Christian
religion" That circumstance was the
starting point Of lifelong testimony
against slavery.
Woolman was poor man. and to earn
his livelihood he learned the tailor's trade.
But he was a simple, sincere, God-fearing
man who loved truth above all things.
From the time the iniquity of human
slavery was borne In upon him he labored
steadfastly to bring about its end. For
| thirty years minister of his sect he
| ira veed on foot from the southern meet
ings of Friends In North Carolina, Nir
ginia and. Maryland, throughout New
Jersey and Pennsylvania. and as far
north as Rhode Island and Massachusetts,
urging the Quakers to abandon negro
slavery among themselves, and TO exert
their influence to abolish Il among others
not of their sect. The effect Of his teach
! ings was seen not only in the action of
yearly meetings Of Friends as far sepa-
rated as Newport and Philade phia. but
In the formation of many abolition socie-
| ties which continually pressed the dues-
ton before state legislatures by petition.
Twelve years after his death in 1712 from
smallpox while on visit to England the
Virginia yearly meeting of the FIR ends
disowned the few remaining members of
the society who had failed to free their
slaves. and so ended slavery in the So
ciety of Friends.
BY almost q hundred years this neglect
ed itinerant Quaker minister had antici-
pated the New England aboiitionists. who
by their virulent attacks upon the south
ern Shareholders helped to make slavery
an irrepressble conflict which must event
ualy be settled on the fields of civil war.
AS pioneer in the rising movement Of
emancipation his work told strongest dur
| ing his time among the Quakers, but their
society was destined to be in the front
of the fight for human freedom up to the
day of final victory. A man who served
his country SO truly from conscience
| when he stood almost as a solitary figure
OF protest deserves to be better remem-
| bered.