TBO.com - TBO is Tampa Bay Online

Abolitionist Tailors Life To God's Calling

ADVERTISEMENT

By ROGER K. MILLER

The Tampa Tribune

Published: December 7, 2008

"The Beautiful Soul of John Woolman, Apostle of Abolition," by Thomas P. Slaughter (Hill and Wang, $27)

"Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proved innocent," George Orwell said. Orwell is not crystal clear as to what they should be considered guilty of, but probably of fraud, self-delusion, woolly thinking, sheer bloody-mindedness, or all of that and more.

Orwell's essay "Reflections on Gandhi" is worth keeping in mind while reading Thomas P. Slaughter's superb study "The Beautiful Soul of John Woolman, Apostle of Abolition," because issues that Orwell brings up in brilliantly concentrated form are writ large in Woolman's saintly life.

Slaughter, professor of history at the University of Rochester and author of several historical works, says Woolman believed "he was abiding God's call to work for social justice and the ascendance of spirituality over humanity's fallen nature." Born in 1720 into one of the founding Quaker families of New Jersey, Woolman went on to a career as an itinerant preacher that to this day makes him revered for many qualities - "some exaggerated to mythic proportions" - as saint, labor reformer, champion of the poor, tax resister, war protester, pacifist, prophet, mystic and founder of the abolitionist movement. It is the last for which he is most widely known.

This is the first full-scale biography of Woolman in more than half a century. Actually, it is a sort of book-length essay or meditation on Woolman's life, or perhaps a spiritual or philosophical biography, rather than a standard "life."

Spirituality, living to please God, was the essence of Woolman's life. He led such an interior existence that in his own writings, he rarely noted external events; for instance, in his "Journal" - which has not gone out of print since 1774 - he neglected to mention that he had gotten married.

Woolman could be petty in his demands and annoyingly persistent. Though raised in a well-off family and circle of friends near Mount Holly, N.J., he lacked the capacity for compromise needed in commerce. He believed that "pursuit of wealth overtaxes the body, mind, and soul." He earned his living as a tailor.

"It is unclear how he assessed his family responsibilities" - Woolman had a wife and daughter - Slaughter says, in noting that he was often away on missions. Out of humility, he walked whenever and wherever possible. On a mission to England, he traveled in steerage out of sympathy with the miserable lives of sailors.

He died there of smallpox in October 1772 and was buried in York. His influence and the sense of his greatness continually grew, peaking among antebellum abolitionists. After the Civil War, he was rediscovered as a reformer and pacifist.

Being John Woolman could not have been easy. Still, though, his wife is little mentioned; being Mrs. John Woolman must have been at least as difficult.

Roger K. Miller, a novelist, freelance writer and editor, writes the blog graustark.blog

spot.com.

Share this:

Loading Comments...

Email Print

ADVERTISEMENT