Women -- Suffrage -- History; Women -- Suffrage -- United States -- History; Women's rights -- History; Women's rights -- United States -- History
"None came with such perfect and entire fullness as the one from which
I quote the closing paragraph:
"'Yes, with all my heart I give my name to your noble call.
"'ELIZABETH CADY STANTON.'
"'You are at liberty to append my own and my wife's name to your
admirable call, "'ANN GREEN PHILLIPS,
"'WENDELL PHILLIPS.'
"Rev. Samuel J. May's letter, full of the warmest sympathy, well
deserves to be quoted entire, but space forbids; suffice it that we
have always known just where to find him.
"'Your business is to launch new ideas--not one of them will ever
be wrecked or lost. Under the dominion of these ideas, right
practice must gradually take the place of wrong, and the first we
shall know we shall find the social swallowing up the political,
and the whole governing its parts.
"'With genuine respect, your co-worker,
"'MRS. PAULINA W. DAVIS. ELIZUR WRIGHT.'
"Letters from Gerrit Smith, Joshua R. Giddings, John G. Whittier,
Ralph Waldo Emerson, A. Bronson Alcott, Caroline Kirkland, Ann Estelle
Lewis, Jane G. Swisshelm, William Elder, Rev. Thomas Brainard, and
many others, expressive of deep interest, are before us.
"The Convention came together in the bright October days, a solemn,
earnest crowd of noble men and women.
"One great disappointment fell upon us. Margaret Fuller, toward whom
many eyes were turned as the future leader in this movement, was not
with us. The 'hungry, ravening sea,' had swallowed her up, and we were
left to mourn her guiding hand--her royal presence. To her, I, at
least, had hoped to confide the leadership of this movement. It can
never be known if she would have accepted it; the desire had been
expressed to her by letter; but be that as it may, she was, and still
is, a leader of thought; a position far more desirable than a leader
of numbers.
"The Convention was called to order by Mrs. Sarah H. Earl,[41] of
Worcester, and a permanent list of officers presented in due order,
and the whole business of the Convention was conducted in a
parliamentary manner. Mrs. Earl, to whose memory we pay tribute
to-day as one gone before, not lost, was one of the loveliest
embodiments of womanhood I have ever known. She possessed a rare
combination of strength, gentleness, and earnestness, with a childlike
freedom and cheerfulness. I miss to-day her clear voice, her graceful
self-poise, her calm dignity.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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