But the working men of England, and I will say it too for the great body
of the middle classes of England, have not been wrong upon this great
question. As for you,--men labouring from morn till night that you may
honourably and honestly maintain your families, and the independence of
your households,--you are too slowly emerging from a condition of things
far from independent--far from free--for you to have sympathy with this
fearful crime which I have been describing. You come, as it were, from
bonds yourselves, and you can sympathize with them who are still in
bondage.
See that meeting that was held in Manchester a month ago, in the Free
Trade Hall, of five or six thousand men. See the address which they
there carried unanimously to the President of the United States. See
that meeting held the other night in Exeter Hall, in London; that vast
room, the greatest room, I suppose, in the Metropolis, filled so much
that its overflowings filled another large room in the same building,
and when that was full, the further overflowings filled the street; and
in both rooms, and in the street, speeches were made on this great
question. But what is said by the writers in this infamous Southern
press in this country with regard to that meeting? Who was there? 'A
gentleman who had written a novel, and two or three Dissenting
ministers,' I shall not attempt any defence of those gentlemen.
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