Sandy’s wife was not behind him in kindness—both seemed to esteem it a privilege to succor me; for, although I was hated by Covey and by my master, I was loved by the colored people, because they thought I was hated for my knowledge, and persecuted because I was feared.
Recounting the kindness he received from fellow slaves, Douglass explains why he was both hated by his masters and loved by his community.
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This was a new and special revelation, dispelling a painful mystery against which my youthful understanding had struggled, and struggled in vain, to wit, the white man’s power to perpetuate the enslavement of the black man.
The anti-slavery platform had performed its work, and my voice was no longer needed.
He was called upon not merely to administer the government, but to decide, in the face of terrible odds, the fate of the Republic.