Friends' Intelligencer Volume 42

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1885 edition. Excerpt: ...of the Father, full of grace and truth. One week later, on the 16th inst., the meeting was silent. There were thirty-four persons present. Yesterday, Hepsabcth C. Ilussey delivered a discourse on the grounds of Friends' adherence to a free gospel ministry and their reasons for not joining in the religious exercises of other denominations. The meeting was somewhat smaller than on the previous Firstday. A notable recent event has been the visit of Frederick Douglass and his wife to this island. Forty-four years ago, on Eighth month 11th, 1841, he made his first appearance before a white audience here. He was here two years afterward, and then did not see the island again until the loth of the present month. What a mighty change have these forty-four years brought with them! In 1S41, the propriety of asking a colored man to appear as a speaker at a meeting was doubted; he had been refused a hearing in several other places, and the meeting was of importance more as Nantucket's testimony in favor of free speech than as her protest against slavery, many taking part in it who were not yet entirely convinced of the wisdom of the movement against slavery, but w-ho were determined that, whatever might be done in other places, Nantucket should have free speech upon her shores. To-day, the once despised slave is a man whom all esteem honorable: --it is not too much to say that his visit to this island has been a triumphal progress, in which young and old, --old Abolitionists and modern Republicans, --have vied with each other in showing him and his wife courteous attention. On the evening of First-day, the Kith, he spoke to an audience which packed the Unitarian Church, the largest building of the sort here. Beginning with his lecture on...