r brother's works,
she solemnly dedicated herself to the cause of peace, persuading
herself that Thomas had left it as a legacy to her and Angelina. She
resolved to use all her best endeavors to promote its advancement, and
daily prayed for a blessing on her exertions and for the success of the
cause. This at least served to divert her thoughts from herself, and no
doubt helped her to the belief which now came to her, that at last
Satan was conquered, and she was accepted of God.

If she could only have been comforted also with the knowledge that her
labors in the ministry were recognized, her satisfaction would have
been complete, but more than ever was she tormented by the slights and
sneers of the elders, and by her own conviction that she was a useless
vessel. There is scarcely a page of her diary that does not tell of
some humiliation, some disappointment connected with her services in
meeting.

CHAPTER X.

Although the Quakers were the first, as a religious society, to
recognize the iniquity of slavery, and to wash their hands of it, so
far as to free all the slaves they owned; few of them saw the further
duty of discouraging it by ceasing all commercial intercourse with
slave-holders. They nearly all continued to trade with the South, and
to use the products of slave-labor. After the appearance in this
country of Elizabeth Heyrick's pamphlet, in which she so strongly urged
upon abolitionists the duty of abstinence from all slave products, the
number was increased of those who declined any and every participation
in the guilt of the slave-holder, and exerted themselves to convert
others to the same views; but the majority of selfish and inconsiderate
people is always large, and it refused to see the good results which
could be reasonably expected from such a system of self-denial. As the
older members, also, of Friends' Society were opposed to all exciting
discussions, and to popular movements generally, while the younger ones
could not smother a natural interest in the great reforms of the day;
it followed that, although all were opposed to slavery in the abstract,
there was no fixed principle of action among them. In their ranks were
all sorts: gradualists and immediatists, advocates of unconditional
emancipation, and colonizationists, thus making it impossible to
discuss the main question without excitement. Therefore all discussion
was discouraged and even forbidden.

The Society never counted amo