SLAVERY QUOTES IV

quotations about slavery


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It was considered as being bad enough to be a slave; but to be a poor man's slave was deemed a disgrace indeed!

FREDERICK DOUGLASS
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Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass


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Better freedom with a crust, than slavery with every luxury.

CHRISTIAN NESTELL BOVEE

Intuitions and Summaries of Thought

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There must doubtless be an unhappy influence on the manners of our people produced by the existence of slavery among us. The whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submissions on the other.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

Notes on the State of Virginia, 1782


In most ages many countries have had part of their inhabitants in a state of slavery; yet it may be doubted whether slavery can ever be supposed the natural condition of man. It is impossible not to conceive that men in their original state were equal; and very difficult to imagine how one would be subjected to another but by violent compulsion. An individual may, indeed, forfeit his liberty by a crime; but he cannot by that crime forfeit the liberty of his children.

SAMUEL JOHNSON

Life of Samuel Johnson, September 23, 1777

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They keep on talking, they're oh so proud
They keep us walking, they scream so loud
They own the venue, they own he crowd
Hey, yeah, slavery

RICHIE HAVENS

"Fates"


Let every voice be thunder, let every heart beat strong
Until all tyrants perish our work shall not be done
Let not our memories fail us the lost year shall be found
Let slavery's chains be broken the whole wide world around.

PETER, PAUL & MARY

"Because All Men Are Brothers"


Of course, most white Southerners of the period were neither villains nor heroes. The majority did not enslave other people, but neither did they advocate the end of slavery or even the softening of slavery. They did not work to halt the worst practices of the era -- the sale of children away from parents, the separation of husbands and wives -- nor did they seek to end the concubinage of enslaved girls and women. Many did not own slaves simply because they couldn't afford them.

LISA RICHARDSON

"A daughter of the Confederacy corrects history", Gulf Times, August 29, 2017


Slavery is bad for the slave, but far worse for the master, as sapping his character and making impossible that moral vigour of the individual on which is based the collective vigour of the nation.

LEONARD HUXLEY

"Life of Professor Huxley", Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley


When you believe, or are led to believe, you are unable to act upon the greatest desires of the soul, the result is mental and spiritual enslavement.

IYANLA VANZANT

Acts of Faith

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Do you, do you remember those days of slavery?
It wasn't black man alone, who died thru bravery.
'Though some a dem threw dem self over board,
because dis ya slaveship overload.

EEK-A-MOUSE

"Do You Remember"


Long ago mama Eve, our good old mother Eve, partook of the forbidden fruit, and this made a slave of her. Adam hated very much to have her taken out of the garden of Eden, and now our old daddy says I believe I will eat of the fruit and become a slave too. This was the first introduction of slavery upon this earth; and there has been not a son or daughter of Adam from that day to this but what were slaves in the true sense of the word. That slavery will continue, until there is a people raised up upon the face of the earth who will contend for righteous principles, who will not only believe in but operate, with every power and faculty given to them to help to establish the kingdom of God, to overcome the devil, and drive him from the earth, then will this curse be removed.

BRIGHAM YOUNG

speech in Joint Session of the Legislature, February 5, 1852

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Willingly no one chooses the yoke of slavery.

AESCHYLUS

Agamemnon

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It is a dire calamity to have a slave; it is an expiable curse to be one.

WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR

Selections from the Writings of Walter Savage Landor

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Excess of liberty, whether it lies in state or individuals, seems only to pass into excess of slavery.

PLATO

The Republic

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People don't buy products--they buy people. It's called slavery. I mean networking. It's called networking.

JAROD KINTZ

This Book Is Not For Sale


I thank God, I shall never again visit a slave-country. To this day, if I hear a distant scream, it recalls with painful vividness my feelings, when passing a house near Pernambuco, I heard the most pitiable moans, and could not but suspect that some poor slave was being tortured, yet knew that I was as powerless as a child even to remonstrate. I suspected that these moans were from a tortured slave, for I was told that this was the case in another instance. Near Rio de Janeiro I lived opposite to an old lady, who kept screws to crush the fingers of her female slaves. I have staid in a house where a young household mulatto, daily and hourly, was reviled, beaten, and persecuted enough to break the spirit of the lowest animal. I have seen a little boy, six or seven years old, struck thrice with a horse-whip (before I could interfere) on his naked head, for having handed me a glass of water not quite clean; I saw his father tremble at a mere glance from his master's eye. ... And these deeds are done and palliated by men, who profess to love their neighbours as themselves, who believe in God, and pray that his Will be done on earth! It makes one's blood boil, yet heart tremble, to think that we Englishmen and our American descendants, with their boastful cry of liberty, have been and are so guilty.

CHARLES DARWIN

The Voyage of the Beagle

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It is the mind of man alone that is the cause of his bondage or freedom.

CHANAKYA

Vridda-Chanakya

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Look back, to slavery, to suffrage, to integration and one thing is clear. Fashions in bigotry come and go. The right thing lasts.

ANNA QUINDLEN

New York Times, January 31, 1993

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In ancient times, as to-day in Asia and Africa, slaves were simply called slaves. In the Middle Ages, they took the name of "serfs", to-day they are called "wage-earners".

MIKHAIL BAKUNIN

Marxism, Freedom and the State

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For some slaves, the first step out of bondage is to learn to see their lives with new eyes. Their reality is a social world where they have their place and some assurance of a subsistence diet. Born into slavery, they cannot easily redefine their lives outside the frame of enslavement.

KEVIN BALES

Understanding Global Slavery

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