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Show Whittier and Garrifon. Then the bold, blue eye grew tender, And the old, harsh face grew mild, As he stooped between the jeering ranks And kissed the negro's child! The shadows of his .. stormy life That moment fell apart : 'Vithout, the rash and bloody hand, \Vithin, the loving heart. That kiss, from all its guilty means, Redeemed the good intent, And round the grisly fighter's hair The Martyr's aureole bent! Perish with him the folly That seeks through evil, good; Long live the generous purpose Unstained with human blood ! Not the raid of midnight terror, nut the thought which underlies; Not the outlaw's pride of daring, But the Christian's sacrifice. 0! never may yon blue-ridged hills The Northern rifle hear, Nor see the light of blazing homes Flash on the negro's spear. But let the free-winged angel Truth Their guarded passes scale, To teach that Right is more than Might And J usticc more than Mail ! So vainly shall Virginia set Her battle in array; In vain her trampling squadrons knead The winter snow with clay. She may strike the pouncing eagle, But she dare not harm the dove ; And every gate she bars to Hate Shall open wide to Love ! Whittier and Garrifon. TilE CRJTJCIS;.\I OF GARRISON. 'Vc have copied into our poetical d<'pnrtmcnt, f rom the N ew York "Independent," ...:orne lines on J o!tn Brown of' 0 ;-;a watomie, from the pen of our gifted fi·i <·nd, J ohn G. "\Vh itti <'r; hut, thongh the entiment is gracefully <·xpr ,~ :-<•cl, we tl1ink tltl're is not the same magnanimous recognition of the liberty-Joy ing he roism of John Brown, which is found in many of the pol't's effusions relating to the war-like struggle of 177G, and " our revolutionary fathers." For example - he speaks of " the ra h and blooc.ly hand"- the "guilty means" with ''the good intent"-" the grisly fighter's hair"-" the folly that . ('<"ks throu(l'h evil good"-" the raid of" midni(l'bt terror"-" I he 0 b outlaw's pride of daring," &c. There is an apparent iiH·idi-ousncss or severity of imputation in these epithets, which dc><'s not seem to be called for, though softened by some approving allusions in close juxtaposition. Let such of us as are l><·li<·vers in the doctrines of peace be careful to award to .Jolin Brown at least as much credit as we do to a Joshua or Gi<ll'on, a '\Va hington or '\Van·cn, and especially not to do him the slightest. inju ~tice. Though he " ·a far from being n nonresistant, yet he was not a man of violence and blood, in a In wless 8cn c, any more than tho~e Jewi. h and Ameri can lt <.T <H's; and if no reproachful epithets ought to be cast upon th r·ir memories, none ought to be en t upon his. In all that ron ~ titutes moral grandeur of character, and entire dis in le rcs tccln e~s of action, he was their superior. lie pcrilled all that wa!' d<'ar to him, not to achieve liberty for himself, or those of his own complexion, but to break the fetters of a race "not colon·d like his own," most wickedly abhorrcc.l, universally pro.;;crib 'd, and snhj<·cted to a bondage full of unutterable woe and horro r. But, even in their behalf, he sought no retaliation nor revenge, but only (if possible) a p eaceful exodus from Vir;.6 nia. lie explicitly declared to tl10 Court, "I never bad any design again. t the liberty of any per~ on, nor any disposil ion to commit treason or destroy property, or to excite or to incite slave., to rebellion. or to make insurrection." And what fair- 26;;. |