upon himself. Insignificant in an historical sense, they really were an
episode, an unpleasant one to be sure for the time being, but no more.
To Garrison, however, they appeared in a wholly different light. It
seemed a rebellion on a pretty grand scale, which called for all his
strength, all the batteries of the friends of freedom, all his terrible
and unsparing severities of speech to quell it. All his artillery he
posted promptly in positions commanding the camp of the mutineers, and
began to pour, as only he could, broadside after broadside into the
works of the wretched little camp of rebels. He could hardly have
expended more energy and ammunition in attacking a strategical point of
Southern slavery, than was expended in punishing a handful of deserters
and insurgents. But, alas! he was not satisfied to draw upon his own
resources for crushing the clerical sedition, he demanded reinforcements
from the central authorities in New York as well. And then began a
contention between him and the Executive Committee of the National
Society, which issued only in ill.

Garrison considered it the duty of the Executive Committee to disapprove
officially of the action of the Massachusetts recalcitrants, and also
the duty of its organ, the _Emancipator_, to rebuke the authors of the
"appeals." Not so, replied Lewis Tappan and Elizur Wright, your request
is unreasonable. If you choose to make a mountain out of a molehill, you
choose to make a mistake which the Executive Committee will not repeat.
Your troubles are wholly local, of no general importance whatever.
"What! Shall a whole army stop its aggressive movements into the
territories of its enemies to charge bayonets on five soldiers,
subalterns, company, or even staff officers, because they stray into a
field to pick berries, throw stones or write an 'appeal?' To be frank
with you we shall make bold to say that we do not approve of the appeal,
it is very censurable, its spirit is bad, but neither do we approve of
your action in the premises, it is also very censurable and its spirit
is bad. What then? shall the Executive Committee condemn the authors of
the appeal and not condemn the editor of the _Liberator_ also? If strict
military justice were done should not both parties be cashiered? Let the
Sabbath and the theoretic theology of the priesthood alone for the
present." "I could have wished, yes, I have wished from the bottom of my
soul," it is Wright who now holds the p