Frederick Douglass: “No man can serve two masters, and the attempt of our Government to do…”

On the record

No man can serve two masters, and the attempt of our Government to do this was a stupendous failure.

Said by

Frederick Douglass

Source

Douglass critiques the failure of the government to balance liberty and slavery, emphasizing the impossibility of serving both.

More from Frederick Douglass

Jan 1, 1881

Everywhere in the south the colored man is learning to read.

Jan 1, 1881

No power beneath the sky can make an ignorant, wasteful, and idle people prosperous, or a licentious people happy.

Jan 1, 1881

They cannot be coaxed or driven to vote with their enemies against their friends.

Jan 1, 1881

We are no longer four millions of slaves, but six millions of freemen.

Frederick Douglass: “No man can serve two masters, and the attempt of our Government to do this was a stupendous failure.”