Henry David Thoreau Quotes

Slavery will not be overthrown without excitement, a most tremendous excitement.

I did say, at Chicago, in my speech there, that I do wish to see the spread of slavery arrested and to see it placed where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in course of ultimate extinction.

Witness, eternal God! Oh, witness that, from this hour, I will do what one man can to drive out this curse of slavery from my land!

My great and exceeding joy over these stupendous achievements, especially over the abolition of slavery (which had been the deepest desire and the great labor of my life), was slightly tinged with a feeling of sadness.

Harriet Tubman and Sojourner Truth were slaves by birth, freedom fighters by temperament.

There will be no peace in this land until slavery is ended.

The work does not end with the abolition of slavery but only begins.

The abolitionists were looked upon as the radicals and militants of their time.

I have no hesitation in believing that less than twenty years ago a man would have been mobbed and the printing office torn down for printing and publishing anything like ‘The Emancipator,’ whereas it now meets the approbation of thousands, and is patronized perhaps at least equal to any other in the state. But little by little, times are, much changed here, until societies, of respectable citizens have arisen to plead the cause of abolition; and instead of it being a disgrace to a man to be a member of these societies, it is rather a mark of the goodness of his heart, and redounds to his honor.

The hour of emancipation is advancing in the march of time. It will come, and whether brought on by generous energy of our own minds or by the bloody process of St. Domingo... is a leaf of our history not yet turned over.

I’ll take my short revolver And my bandolier of lead, And live or die I can but try To avenge my country’s dead …. I’ve always hated slavery Since the day that I was born So I’m of to join the IRA And I’m off tomorrow morn

It is hard for the old slave holding spirit to die. But die it must.

Don’t fight for slavery! Fight for liberty! [...] You, the people, have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness! You, the people, have the power to make this life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure.

Those of us who always abhorred slavery as an atheistical iniquity, gladly we join in the exulting chorus of humanity over its downfall.

Abolish slavery tomorrow, and not a sentence or syllable of the Constitution need be altered. It was purposely so framed as to give no claim, no sanction to the claim, of property in man. If in its origin slavery had any relation to the government, it was only as the scaffolding to the magnificent structure, to be removed as soon as the building was completed.

Free labor has the inspiration of hope; pure slavery has no hope.

The very founders that wrote those documents worked tirelessly until slavery was no more.

Your late purchase of an estate in the colony of Cayenne, with a view to emancipating the slaves on it, is a generous and noble proof of your humanity. Would to God a like spirit would diffuse itself generally into the minds of the people of this country; but I despair of seeing it.

I don't think the people of the slave states will ever consider the subject of slavery in its true light till some other argument is resorted to other than moral persuasion.

Many houses were still full of light when, at the close of March 22, the people of the Círculo returned to their homes, which were gladdened with a fleeting gladness by an hour of justice - for there are still many slaves, black and white, in Puerto Rico!

The success of the abolitionist movement lay in its making real for people in Britain and America the slave ship's pervasive and utterly instrumental terror, which was indeed its defining feature.

The slave power dares anything, and it can be conquered only by the united masses of the people. From Congress to the people, I appeal.

The day is not distant when we must bear and adopt [the abolition of slavery], or worse will follow.

If not for the direct action of a John Brown and his comrades, America would still trade in the flesh of the black man.

In one point of view, we, the abolitionists and colored people, should meet [the Dred Scott] decision, unlooked for and monstrous as it appears, in a cheerful spirit. This very attempt to blot out forever the hopes of an enslaved people may be one necessary link in the chain of events preparatory to the downfall and complete overthrow of the whole slave system.