Frederick Douglass

They suppress the truth rather than take the consequence of telling it, and in so doing prove themselves a part of the human family.

Frederick Douglass

They who study mankind with a whip in their hands will always go wrong.

Frederick Douglass

This war, disguise it as they may, is virtually nothing more or less than perpetual slavery against universal freedoms.

Frederick Douglass

Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground.

Frederick Douglass

To make a contented slave it is necessary to make a thoughtless one. It is necessary to darken the moral and mental vision and, as far as possible, to annihilate the power of reason.

Frederick Douglass

To suppress free speech is a double wrong. It violates the rights of the hearer as well as those of the speaker.

Frederick Douglass

We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and the future.

Frederick Douglass

We succeed, not alone by the laborious exertions of our faculties, be they small or great, but by the regular, thoughtful and systematic exercise of them.

Frederick Douglass

What I ask for the Negro is not benevolence, not pity, not sympathy, but simply justice.

Frederick Douglass

What to the Slave is the 4th of July.

Frederick Douglass