Quote

I didn't know I was a slave until I found out I couldn't do the things I wanted.

Frederick Douglass

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Frederick Douglass
Age: 77 †
Born: 1818
Born: February 14
Died: 1895
Died: February 20
Abolitionist
Autobiographer
Businessperson
Caulker
Diplomat
Editor
Film Editor
Journalist
Orator
Politician
Suffragist
Writer
Talbot County
Maryland
Frederick Augustus Washington Bailey
Frederick Augustus Washington Baly
Fred Bailey
Freddie Bailey
Found
Didn
Wanted
Things
Slavery
Slave
Couldn

More quotes by Frederick Douglass

Image
Educate your sons and daughters, send them to school, and show them that beside the cartridge box, the ballot box, and the jury box, you also have the knowledge box.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Now, take the Constitution according to its plain reading, and I defy the presentation of a single pro-slavery clause in it. On the other hand it will be found to contain principles and purposes, entirely hostile to the existence of slavery.
Frederick Douglass
Image
In the struggle for justice, the only reward is the opportunity to be in the struggle. You can't expect that you're going to have it tomorrow. You just have to keep working on it.
Frederick Douglass
Image
[John Brown's] zeal in the cause of freedom was infinitely superior to mine. Mine was as the taper light, his was as the burning sun... I could speak for the slave. John Brown could fight for the slave.
Frederick Douglass
Image
[...] allowing only ordinary ability and opportunity, we may explain success mainly by one word and that word is WORK! WORK!! WORK!!! WORK!!!! Not transient and fitful effort, but patient, enduring, honest, unremitting and indefatigable work into which the whole heart is put[...] There is no royal road to perfection.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Oppression makes a wise man mad.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Praying for freedom never did me any good til I started praying with my feet.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Did John Brown fail? John Brown began the war that ended American slavery and made this a free Republic.
Frederick Douglass
Image
As those who believe in the visibility of ghosts can easily see them, so it is always easy to see repulsive qualities in those we despise and hate.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Beat and cuff your slave, keep him hungry and spiritless, and he will follow the chain of his master like a dog. Feed and clothe him well, work him moderately, surround him with physical comfort and dreams of freedom intrude.
Frederick Douglass
Image
The opposite of compromise is character.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Mr. Lincoln was not only a great President, but a great man - too great to be small in anything. In his company I was never in any way reminded of my humble origin, or of my unpopular color.
Frederick Douglass
Image
A man, at times, gets something for nothing, but it will, in his hands, amount to nothing.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Slaves are generally expected to sing as well as to work.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Fugitive slaves were rare then, and as a fugitive slave lecturer, I had the advantage of being the first one out.
Frederick Douglass
Image
I have no accurate knowledge of my age, never having seen any authentic record containing it.
Frederick Douglass
Image
A gentleman will not insult me, and no man not a gentleman can insult me.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Some know the value of education by having it. I know it's value by not having it.
Frederick Douglass
Image
Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.
Frederick Douglass