University of Virginia Library

16. CHAPTER XVI.
THE PURPOSE.

It would be scarcely possible to describe the scene which
Harry left in the library. Tom Gordon was for a few
moments stunned by the violence of his fall, and Clayton
and Mr. Jekyl at first did not know but he had sustained
some serious injury; and the latter, in his confusion, came
very near attempting his recovery, by pouring in his face
the contents of the large ink-stand. Certainly, quite as
appropriate a method, under the circumstances, as the
exhortations with which he had deluged Harry. But Clayton,
with more presence of mind, held his hand, and rang for
water. In a few moments, however, Tom recovered himself,
and started up furiously.

“Where is he?” he shouted, with a volley of oaths;
which made Mr. Jekyl pull up his shirt-collar, as became a
good elderly gentleman, preparatory to a little admonition.

“My young friend — ” he began.

“Blast you! None of your young friends to me! Where
is he?”

“He has escaped,” said Clayton, quietly.

“He got right out of the window,” said Mr. Jekyl.

“Confound you, why did n't you stop him?” said Tom,
violently.

“If that question is addressed to me,” said Clayton, “I
do not interfere in your family affairs.”

“You have interfered, more than you ever shall again!”
said Tom, roughly. “But, there 's no use talking now;
that fellow must be chased! He thinks he 's got away from

me — we 'll see! I 'll make such an example of him as
shall be remembered!” He rang the bell violently. “Jim,”
he said, “did you see Harry go off on my horse?”

“Yes, sah!”

“Then, why in thunder did n't you stop him?”

“I tought Mas'r Tom sent him — did so!”

“You knew better, you dog! And now, I tell you, order
out the best horses, and be on after him! And, if you don't
catch him, it shall be the worse for you! — Stay! Get me a
horse! I 'll go myself.”

Clayton saw that it was useless to remain any longer at
Canema. He therefore ordered his horse, and departed.
Tom Gordon cast an evil eye after him, as he rode away.

“I hate that fellow!” he said. “I 'll make him mischief,
one of these days, if I can!”

As to Clayton, he rode away in bitterness of spirit.
There are some men so constituted that the sight of injustice,
which they have no power to remedy, is perfectly maddening
to them. This is a very painful and unprofitable constitution,
so far as this world is concerned; but they can no
more help it than they can the tooth-ache. Others may say
to them, “Why, what is it to you? You can't help it, and
it 's none of your concern;” but still the fever burns on.
Besides, Clayton had just passed through one of the great
crises of life. All there is in that strange mystery of what
man can feel for woman had risen like a wave within him;
and, gathering into itself, for a time, the whole force of his being,
had broken, with one dash, on the shore of death, and the
waters had flowed helplessly backward. In the great void
which follows such a crisis, the soul sets up a craving and
cry for something to come in to fill the emptiness; and
while the heart says no person can come into that desolate
and sacred enclosure, it sometimes embraces a purpose, as
in some sort a substitute.

In this manner, with solemnity and earnestness, Clayton
resolved to receive as a life-purpose a struggle with this
great system of injustice, which, like a parasitic weed, had

struck its roots through the whole growth of society, and
was sucking thence its moisture and nourishment.

As he rode through the lonely pine-woods, he felt his
veins throbbing and swelling with indignation and desire.
And there arose within him that sense of power which sometimes
seems to come over man like an inspiration, and leads
him to say, “This shall not be, and this shall be;” as if he
possessed the ability to control the crooked course of human
events. He was thankful in his heart that he had taken the
first step, by entering his public protest against this injustice,
in quitting the bar of his native state. What was next
to be done, how the evil was to be attacked, how the
vague purpose fulfilled, he could not say. Clayton was not
aware, any more than others in his situation have been, of
what he was undertaking. He had belonged to an old and
respected family, and always, as a matter of course, been
received in all circles with attention, and listened to with
respect. He who glides dreamily down the glassy surface
of a mighty river floats securely, making his calculations
to row upward. He knows nothing what the force of that
seemingly glassy current will be when his one feeble oar is
set against the whole volume of its waters. Clayton did
not know that he was already a marked man; that he had
touched a spot, in the society where he lived, which was
vital, and which that society would never suffer to be
touched with impunity. It was the fault of Clayton, and is
the fault of all such men, that he judged mankind by himself.
He could not believe that anything, except ignorance
and inattention, could make men upholders of deliberate
injustice. He thought all that was necessary was the
enlightening of the public mind, the direction of general
attention to the subject. In his way homeward he revolved
in his mind immediate measures of action. This evil should
no longer be tampered with. He would take on himself the
task of combining and concentrating those vague impulses
towards good which he supposed were existing in the community.
He would take counsel of leading minds. He

would give his time to journeyings through the state; he
would deliver addresses, write in the newspapers, and do
what otherwise lies in the power of a free man who wishes to
reach an utterly unjust law. Full of these determinations,
Clayton entered again his father's house, after two days of
solitary riding. He had written in advance to his parents
of the death of Nina, and had begged them to spare him
any conversation on that subject; and, therefore, on his
first meeting with his mother and father, there was that
painful blank, that heavy dulness of suffering, which comes
when people meet together, feeling deeply on one absorbing
subject, which must not be named. It was a greater self-denial
to his impulsive, warm-hearted mother than to Clayton.
She yearned to express sympathy; to throw herself
upon his neck; to draw forth his feelings, and mingle them
with her own. But there are some people with whom this
is impossible; it seems to be their fate that they cannot
speak of what they suffer. It is not pride nor coldness, but
a kind of fatal necessity, as if the body were a marble prison,
in which the soul were condemned to bleed and suffer alone.
It is the last triumph of affection and magnanimity, when a
loving heart can respect that suffering silence of its beloved,
and allow that lonely liberty in which only some natures
can find comfort.

Clayton's sorrow could only be measured by the eagerness
and energy with which, in conversation, he pursued
the object with which he endeavored to fill his mind.

“I am far from looking forward with hope to any success
from your efforts,” said Judge Clayton, “the evil is so
radical.”

“I sometimes think,” said Mrs. Clayton, “that I regret
that Edward began as he did. It was such a shock to the
prejudices of people!”

“People have got to be shocked,” said Clayton, “in
order to wake them up out of old absurd routine. Use
paralyzes us to almost every injustice; when people are
shocked, they begin to think and to inquire.”

“But would it not have been better,” said Mrs. Clayton,
“to have preserved your personal influence, and thus have
insinuated your opinions more gradually? There is such a
prejudice against abolitionists; and, when a man makes
any sudden demonstration on this subject, people are apt
to call him an abolitionist, and then his influence is all gone,
and he can do nothing.”

“I suspect,” said Clayton, “there are multitudes now in
every part of our state who are kept from expressing what
they really think, and doing what they ought to do, by this
fear. Somebody must brave this mad-dog cry; somebody
must be willing to be odious; and I shall answer the purpose
as well as anybody.”

“Have you any definite plan of what is to be attempted?”
said his father.

“Of course,” said Clayton, “a man's first notions on
such a subject must be crude; but it occurred to me, first,
to endeavor to excite the public mind on the injustice of the
present slave-law, with a view to altering it.”

“And what points would you alter?” said Judge Clayton.

“I would give to the slave the right to bring suit for injury,
and to be a legal witness in court. I would repeal the
law forbidding their education, and I would forbid the separation
of families.”

Judge Clayton sat pondering. At length he said, “And
how will you endeavor to excite the public mind?”

“I shall appeal first,” said Clayton, “to the church and
the ministry.”

“You can try it,” said his father.

“Why,” said Mrs. Clayton, “these reforms are so evidently
called for, by justice and humanity, and the spirit of
the age, that I can have no doubt that there will be a general
movement among all good people in their favor.”

Judge Clayton made no reply. There are some cases
where silence is the most disagreeable kind of dissent, because
it admits of no argument in reply.

“In my view,” said Clayton, “the course of legal reform,
in the first place, should remove all those circumstances in
the condition of the slaves which tend to keep them in ignorance
and immorality, and make the cultivation of self-respect
impossible; such as the want of education, protection
in the family state, and the legal power of obtaining
redress for injuries. After that, the next step would be
to allow those masters who are so disposed to emancipate,
giving proper security for the good behavior of their servants.
They might then retain them as tenants. Under this
system, emancipation would go on gradually; only the best
masters would at first emancipate, and the example would
be gradually followed. The experiment would soon demonstrate
the superior cheapness and efficiency of the system of
free labor; and self-interest would then come in, to complete
what principle began. It is only the first step that costs.
But it seems to me that in the course of my life I have met
with multitudes of good people, groaning in secret under
the evils and injustice of slavery, who would gladly give
their influence to any reasonable effort which promises in
time to ameliorate and remove them.”

“The trouble is,” said Judge Clayton, “that the system,
though ruinous in the long run to communities, is immediately
profitable to individuals. Besides this, it is a source
of political influence and importance. The holders of slaves
are an aristocracy supported by special constitutional privileges.
They are united against the spirit of the age by a
common interest and danger, and the instinct of self-preservation
is infallible. No logic is so accurate.

“As a matter of personal feeling, many slaveholders
would rejoice in some of the humane changes which you
propose; but they see at once that any change endangers
the perpetuity of the system on which their political importance
depends. Therefore, they 'll resist you at the very
outset, not because they would not, many of them, be glad
to have justice done, but because they think they cannot
afford it.

“They will have great patience with you — they will
even have sympathy with you — so long as you confine
yourself merely to the expression of feeling; but the moment
your efforts produce the slightest movement in the
community, then, my son, you will see human nature in a
new aspect, and know more about mankind than you know
now.”

“Very well,” said Clayton, “the sooner the better.”

“Well, Edward,” said Mrs. Clayton, “if you are going
to begin with the ministry, why don't you go and talk to
your Uncle Cushing? He is one of the most influential
among the Presbyterians in the whole state; and I have
often heard him lament, in the strongest manner, the evils
of slavery. He has told me some facts about its effect on
the character of his church-members, both bond and free,
that are terrible!”

“Yes,” said Judge Clayton, “your brother will do all
that. He will lament the evils of slavery in private circles,
and he will furnish you any number of facts, if you will not
give his authority for them.”

“And don't you think that he will be willing to do something?”

“No,” said Judge Clayton, “not if the cause is unpopular.”

“Why,” said Mrs. Clayton, “do you suppose that my
brother will be deterred from doing his duty for fear of personal
unpopularity?”

“No,” said Judge Clayton; “but your brother has the
interest of Zion on his shoulders, — by which he means the
Presbyterian organization, — and he will say that he can't
afford to risk his influence. And the same will be true of
every leading minister of every denomination. The Episcopalians
are keeping watch over Episcopacy, the Methodists
over Methodism, the Baptists over Baptism. None of them
dare espouse an unpopular cause, lest the others, taking advantage
of it, should go beyond them in public favor.

None of them will want the odium of such a reform as
this.”

“But I don't see any odium in it,” said Mrs. Clayton.
“It 's one of the noblest and one of the most necessary of
all possible changes.”

“Nevertheless,” said Judge Clayton, “it will be made
to appear extremely odious. The catch-words of abolition,
incendiarism, fanaticism, will fly thick as hail. And the
storm will be just in proportion to the real power of the
movement. It will probably end in Edward's expulsion
from the state.”

“My father, I should be unwilling to think,” said Clayton,
“that the world is quite so bad as you represent it, —
particularly the religious world.”

“I was not aware that I was representing it as very
bad,” said Judge Clayton. “I only mentioned such facts
as everybody can see about them. There are undoubtedly
excellent men in the church.”

“But,” said Clayton, “did not the church, in the primitive
ages, stand against the whole world in arms? If religion
be anything, must it not take the lead of society, and
be its sovereign and teacher, and not its slave?”

“I don't know as to that,” said Judge Clayton. “I
think you 'll find the facts much as I have represented them.
What the church was in the primitive ages, or what it ought
to be now, is not at all to our purpose, in making practical
calculations. Without any disrespect, I wish to speak of
things just as they are. Nothing is ever gained by false
expectations.”

“O,” said Mrs. Clayton, “you lawyers get so uncharitable!
I 'm quite sure that Edward will find brother ready to
go heart and hand with him.”

“I 'm sure I shall be glad of it, if he does,” said Judge
Clayton.

“I shall write to him about it, immediately,” said Mrs.
Clayton, “and Edward shall go and talk with him. Courage,
Edward! Our woman's instincts, after all, have some

prophetic power in them. At all events, we women will
stand by you to the last.”

Clayton sighed. He remembered the note Nina had
written him on the day of the decision, and thought what a
brave-hearted little creature she was; and, like the faint
breath of a withered rose, the shadowy remembrance of her
seemed to say to him, “Go on!”