The Public Record
Frederick Douglass was an American social reformer, abolitionist, orator, writer, and statesman. He was "the most important leader of the movement for African-American civil rights in the 19th century".
It was not so much the need of the union, as the need of himself, that he should speak; the time when the union needed him, and all others, was when the slaveholding rebellion raised its defiant head, not when as now, that head was in the…
Heavy had been his burden, hard had been his toil, bitter had been his trials, and terrible had been his anxiety; but the future seemed now bright and full of hope.
But we are not here to applaud manly courage, save as it has been displayed in a noble cause.
But, alas! what are all good and great qualities; what are human hopes and human happiness to the revengeful hand of an assassin?
My great and exceeding joy over these stupendous achievements, especially over the abolition of slavery (which had been the deepest desire and the great labor of my life), was slightly tinged with a feeling of sadness.
I felt I had reached the end of the noblest and best part of my life; my school was broken up, my church disbanded, and the beloved congregation dispersed, never to come together again.
Land is not worth much where there are no people to occupy it, and a mule is not worth much where there is no one to drive him.
A man in the situation I found myself, has not only to divest himself of the old, which is never easily done, but to adjust himself to the new, which is still more difficult.
It proved, as to its immediate effect, a great mistake, for my carefully studied and written address, full of learned quotations, fell dead at my feet, while a few remarks I made extemporaneously at collation, were enthusiastically…
I found that the success of a lecturer depends more upon the quality of his stock in store, than the amount.
I looked into this kitchen with peculiar interest, and remembered that it was there I last saw my mother.
The journal was valuable while it lasted, and the experiment was full of instruction to me, which has to some extent been heeded, for I have kept well out of newspaper undertakings since.