Letters of Lydia Maria Child, with a biographical introduction by John G. Whittier and an appendix by Wendell Phillips.

LETTERS. 2:55
Garrison. He has been a singularly fortunate man.
Fortunate in accomplishing his purposes; folrtunllate
in drawing around him the best spirits of his time;
fortunate in hlaving an amiable, sympathizing wife;
fortunate in having excellent, devoted children, whose
marriages have suited him, and who have lived in
proximity to him; fortunate in having his energies
developed by struggle in early life; fortunate in later
years in being at ease in his worldly circumstances;
and most fortunate of all in dying before his mind
became weakened. Death will be to him merely
passing out of one room filled with friends into another room still more full of friends.
It is wonderful how one mortal may affect the destiny of a multitude. I remember very distinctly the
first time I ever saw Garrison. I little thought then
that the whole pattern of my life-web would be
chianged by that introduction. I was then all absorbed in poetry and painting, soaring aloft on
Psyche-wings into the ethereal regions of mysticism.
Hie got hold of the strings of my conscience and
pulled me into reforms. It is of no use to imagine
what might have been, if I had never met him. Old
dreams vanished, old associates departed, and all
things became new. But the new surroundings were
all alive, and they brought a moral discipline worth
ten times the sacrifice they cost. But why use the
word sacrifice? I was never conscious of any sacrifice. A new stimulus seized my whole being, and
carried me whithersoever it would. "I could not
otherwise, so help me God!" How the same circumstances changed the whole coloring of life for Charles
Sumner and Wendell Phillips! The hour of nation-'
expiation had come, and men and women must needs