Blog #8

An apparent belief in both "John Brown's Last Speech" and in Henry Garnet's "From a Memorial Discourse" is that in order to completely get rid of slavery and in turn, accomplish the American Dream,  there has to be many lives lost. There will be fighting and bloodshed. Garnet says he is constantly asked the question "when and where will the demands of the reformers of this and coming ages end?" His response contains has many elements that involve fighting..."when our brave and gallant soldiers shall have justice done to them." Garnet also mentions having to be forgiven for "national sins". In many people's eyes, in order to achieve the American Dream, one must be freed of their sins. Garnet says "Great sacrifices have been made by the people; yet, greater still are demanded ere atonement can be made for our national sins." This is basically saying that sacrifices have always been a part of achieving something and they always will be.
Similar to all of this is John Brown's speech. Brown is on the verge of sacrificing his own life for the sake of not backing down on his view of slavery. He is willing to die in order to help the slaves. Towards the end of his speech he says "If it is deemed necessary that  I should forfeit my life for the furtherance of the ends of justice, and mingle my blood further with the blood of my children and with the blood of millions in this slave country whose rights are disregarded by wicked, cruel, and inject enactments, I say let it be done." This quote not only shows Brown's compassion towards the issue, but also the compassion of "millions" of others who have also laid down their lives for the issue of slavery.
One of these pieces was written by a white man and one was written by an African American who had been freed. This shows that it was relevant to not only the blacks, how difficult it was to achieve the American Dream. Someone will always be having to lose their life in order for someone else to live or be free. If someone in the north were to be reading these pieces of writing, I think it would really show them how bad this issue was in the South. Also, for a southerner who was a slave holder to read about a white man giving up his own life for slaves, it had to make them think about what they were doing at least a little bit.