... continual hard labor deadens the energies of the soul, and benumbs the faculties of the mind; the ideas become confined, the m...ind barren, and, like the scorching sands of Arabia, produces nothing; or, like the uncultivated soil, brings forth thorns and thistles. Again, continual hard labor irritates our tempers and sours our dispositions; the whole system become worn out with toil and fatigue; nature herself becomes almost exhausted, and we care but little whether we live or die.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
... there are no chains so galling as the chains of ignorance--no fetters so binding as those that bind the soul, and exclude it f...rom the vast field of useful and scientific knowledge. O, had I received the advantages of early education, my ideas would, ere now, have expanded far and wide; but, alas! I possess nothing but moral capability--no teachings but the teachings of the Holy Spirit.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
African rights and liberty is a subject that ought to fire the breast of every free man of color in these United States, and excit...e in his bosom a lively, deep, decided and heart-felt interest.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Possess the spirit of independence. The Americans do, and why should not you? Possess the spirit of men, bold and enterprising, fe...arless and undaunted. Sue for your rights and privileges. Know the reason that you cannot attain them. Weary them with your importunities. You can but die, if you make the attempt; we shall certainly die if you do not. The Americans have practised nothing but head-work these 200 years, and we have done their drudgery. And is it not high time for us to imitate their examples, and practise head-work too, and keep what we have got, and get what we can?LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
... it is not the color of the skin that makes the man or the woman, but the principle formed in the soul. Brilliant wit will shin...e, come from whence it will; and genius and talent will not hide the brightness of its lustre.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
...I am ... one of the wretched and miserable daughters of the descendants of fallen Africa. Do you ask, why are you wretched and ...miserable? I reply, look at many of the most worthy and interesting of us doomed to spen our lives in gentlemen's kitchens. Look at our young men, smark, active and energetic, with souls filled with ambitious fire; if they can look forward, alas! what are their prospects? they can be nothing but the humblest laborers, on account of their dark complexions; hence many of them lose their ambition, and become worthless. Look at our middle-aged men, clad in their rusty plaids and coats; in winter, every cent they earn goes to buy their wood and pay their rents; their poor wives also toil beyond their strength, to help support their families. Look at our aged sires, whose heads are whitened with the frosts of seventy winters, with their old wood-saws on their backs. Alas, what keeps us so? Prejudice, ignorance, and poverty.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Take us generally as a people, we are neither lazy nor idle; and considering how little we have to excite or stimulate us, I am al...most astonished that there are so many industrious and ambitious ones to be found; although I acknowledge, with extreme sorrow, that there are some who never were and never will be serviceable to society. And have you not a similar class among yourselves?LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
... such is the horrible idea that I entertain respecting a life of servitude, that if I conceived of there being no possibility o...f my rising above the condition of servant, I would gladly hail death as a welcome messenger.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »