As I writhed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy. It opened my eyes to the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out. In moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their stupidity.

— Frederick Douglass

Frederick Douglass Quotes

Driven intosemi-exile by civil and barbarous laws, and by a system which cannot be thought of without a shudder, I was fullyjustified in turning, if possible, the tide of the moral universeagainst the heaven-daring outrage.

— Frederick Douglass

Why am I a slave?

— Frederick Douglass

I say, this picture sometimes appalled us, and made us rather bear those ills we had. Than fly to others, that we knew not of.

— Frederick Douglass

In studying the character and works of a great man, it is always desirable to learn in what he is distinguished from others, and what have been the causes if this difference.

— Frederick Douglass

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. From my earliest recollection, I date the entertainment of a deep conviction that slavery would not always be able to hold me within its foul embrace.

— Frederick Douglass

Another advantage I gained in my new master was, he made no pretensions to, or profession of, religion; and this, in my opinion, was truly a great advantage.

— Frederick Douglass

No one idea has given rise to more oppression and persecution toward colored people of this country than that which makes Africa, not America, their home.

— Frederick Douglass

I am left in the hottest hell of unending slavery. O God, save me! God, deliver me! Let me be free! Is there any God? Why am I a slave? I will run away. I will not stand it. Get caught, or get clear, I’ll try it. I had as well die with ague as the fever, I have only one life to lose. I had as well be killed running as die standing. Only think of it; one hundred miles straight north, and I am free! Try it? Yes! God helping me, I will. It cannot be that I shall live and die a slave.

— Frederick Douglass

H. H. GARNET. We need a thousand such representative.

— Frederick Douglass

The same traits of character might be seen in Colonel Lloyd’s slaves, as are seen in the slaves of the political parties.

— Frederick Douglass

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

— Frederick Douglass

No man whose vision is bounded by colour can come into contact with what is highest and best in the world.

— Frederick Douglass

Of all of the other twenty-seven black autobiographies published before 1846, only six went through four or more editions during the nineteenth century and only three of these were translated into foreign languages.

— Frederick Douglass

Give me the making of a nation’s ballads and I care not who has the making of its Laws.

— Frederick Douglass

What he most dreaded, that I most desired. What he most loved, that I most hated. That which to him was a great evil, to be carefully shunned, was to me a great good, to be diligently sought; and the argument which he so warmly urged, against my learning to read, only served to inspire me with a desire and determination to learn.

— Frederick Douglass

They were great in their day and generation.

— Frederick Douglass

As I writhed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy. It opened my eyes to the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out. In moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their stupidity.

— Frederick Douglass

When I think that these precious souls are to-day shut up in the prison-house of slavery, my feelings overcome me, and I am almost ready to ask, “Does a righteous God govern the universe? and for what does he hold the thunders in his right hand, if not to smite the oppressor, and deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the spoiler?

— Frederick Douglass

The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be denounced.

— Frederick Douglass

Any thing, no matter what, to get rid of thinking! It was this everlasting thinking of my condition that tormented me. There was no getting rid of it.

— Frederick Douglass
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