Frederick Douglass

Right is of no sex; truth is of no color; God is the Father of us all, and we are all brethren.

A man who will not lie, will not steal.

The destiny of the colored American... is the destiny of America.

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.

The day is not far distant when the whole class of slaveholders will be swept away.

I am a man, and nothing human is alien to me.

Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed on them.

The relation between the white and colored people of this country is the great, the cardinal, the vital question of the twentieth century.

Once thoroughly broken down, who is he that can repair the damage?

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

The Bible addresses all such persons as 'fools,' and 'things of naught.'

I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land.

In thinking of America, I sometimes find myself admiring her bright blue sky, her grand old woods, her fertile fields, her beautiful rivers, her mighty lakes, and star-crowned mountains. But my rapture is soon checked, my joy is soon turned to mourning.

The American people and the Government at Washington know how to defeat traitors at home.

The life of the nation is secure only while the nation is honest, truthful, and virtuous.

Fugitive slaves were not only persons escaping from slavery, but they were persons escaping to freedom.

I was broken in body, soul, and spirit. My natural elasticity was crushed, my intellect languished, the disposition to read departed, the cheerful spark that lingered about my eye died; the dark night of slavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a brute!

The white man's heaven is scarcely known to the black man.

My heart is as full of joy as of sorrow.

The Constitution of the United States is a wonderful document.