Frederick Douglass Quotes

In raising a people from slavery to freedom, you have called them to act on a new theatre; and it is a necessary part of your business, to teach them how to perform their parts.

I am the dream and the hope of the slave

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

It is so sad that it takes so long for people to understand what needs to happen in order to be free.

Transformation is only valid if it is carried out with the people, not for them. Liberation is like a childbirth, and a painful one. The person who emerges is a new person: no longer either oppressor or oppressed, but a person in the process of achieving freedom. It is only the oppressed who, by freeing themselves, can free their oppressors.

Not only was I not born to be a slave; I was not born to hope to become the equal of the slave master.

We say no to the peace that keeps us on our knees, no to the peace that keeps us in chains, no to the false peace that denies the values and contributions of our peoples.

Trust me that as I ignore all law to help the slave, so will I ignore it all to protect an enslaved woman.

Emancipation - what is meant by it? Simply that the slaves shall cease to be held as property and shall henceforth be held and treated as human beings. Simply, that we should take our feet from off their necks.

Emancipation is the demand of civilization. That is a principle; everything else is an intrigue.

The glorious spectacle of eighteen millions of people, struggling to burst their chains and be free.

The slave must be made fit for his freedom by education and discipline and thus made unfit for slavery.

… true emancipation begins neither at the polls nor in the courts. It begins in woman's soul. History tells us that every oppressed class gained true liberation from its masters through its own efforts.

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

Who but shall learn that freedom is the prize Man still is bound to rescue or maintain; That nature's God commands the slave to rise, And on the oppressor's head to break the chain. Roll, years of promise, rapidly roll round, Till not a slave shall on this earth by found.

Death is a slave's freedom.

Subjection of any kind and in any place is beneath the dignity of man ... the highest joy is to fight by the side of those who for any reason of their own making or ours, are unable to develop to full human stature.

Slavery is slavery. The chain of gold is quite as bad as the chain of iron. Is there a way out?

They tell me: If you see a slave sleeping, do not wake him lest he be dreaming of freedom. I tell them: If you see a slave sleeping, wake him and explain to him freedom.

To end slavery, you must overcome the mental and physical inertia of the masses and quicken their intelligence and creative faculty.

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

The name of peace is sweet and the thing itself good, but between peace and slavery there is the greatest difference.

We're not trying to take power away or rule anybody - we're just trying to get up from under the rulers.

I am not yet born; O fill me with strength against those who would freeze my humanity.

Death is better than slavery.