Frederick Douglass

By far the larger part of the slaves know as little of their ages as horses know of theirs, and it is the wish of most masters within my knowledge to keep their slaves thus ignorant.

Genealogical trees do not flourish among slaves.

They measured the ages of their children by spring-time, winter-time, harvest-time, planting-time, and the like.

The louder she screamed, the harder he whipped; and where the blood ran fastest, there he whipped longest.

Slavery does away with fathers, as it does away with families.

Everybody in the South seemed to want the privilege of whipping somebody else.

Slaves sing most when they are most unhappy.

Her grave is, as the grave of the dead at sea, unmarked, and without stone or stake.

Food to the indolent is poison, not sustenance.

I have often sung to drown my sorrow, but seldom to express my happiness.

The slaveholder, as well as the slave, is the victim of the slave system.

But regrets with slaves were unavailing: my wishes were nothing; my happiness was the sport of my master.

To be accused was to be convicted, and to be convicted was to be punished; the one always following the other with immutable certainty.

The songs of the slave represent the sorrows, rather than the joys, of his heart; and he is relieved by them, only as an aching heart is relieved by its tears.

I had as well be killed running as die standing.

I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others, rather than to be false, and incur my own abhorrence.

That which he most loved I most hated; and the very determination which he expressed to keep me in ignorance, only rendered me the more resolute in seeking intelligence.

Who would be free, themselves must strike the blow!

From that moment, I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom.

Nature had made us friends; slavery made us enemies.