Frederick Douglass
American abolitionist, writer and statesman, 1818-1895
17 quotes.
Quotes by Frederick Douglass
- All human experience proves over and over again, that any success which comes through meanness, trickery, fraud and dishonor, is but emptiness and will only be a torment to its possessor.
- From that moment, I understood the pathway from slavery to freedom.
- He who wants hard hands must not, at sight of the first blister, fling away the spade, the rake, the broad ax or the hoe; for the blister is a primary condition to the needed hardness.
- I am certain that there is nothing good, great or desirable which man can possess in this world, that does not come by some kind of labor, either physical or mental, moral or spiritual.
- I prayed for freedom for twenty years, but received no answer until I prayed with my legs.
- 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.
- I would unite with anybody to do right; and with nobody to do wrong.
- It does not matter that the wind is fair and the tide at its flood, if the mariner refuses to weigh his anchor and spread his canvas to the breeze.
- It is not luck, nor is it great mental endowments, but it is well directed, honest toil.
- No man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck.
- Not transient and fitful effort, but patient, enduring, honest, unremitting and indefatigable work, into which the whole heart is put, and which, in both temporal and spiritual affairs, is the true miracle worker.
- One and God make a majority.
- The lesson taught at this point by human experience is simply this, that the man who will get up will be helped up; and the man who will not get up will be allowed to stay down.
- The man who is right is a majority. We, who have God and conscience on our side, have a majority against the universe.
- The man who lies down a fool at night, hoping that he will waken wise in the morning, will rise up in the morning as he laid down in the evening.
- To be able to walk well, one must walk on, and to work with ease and effect, one must work on.
- Without culture there can be no growth; without exertion, no acquisition; without friction, no polish; without labor, no knowledge; without action, no progress and without conflict, no victory.