The crown of martyrdom is high, far beyond the reach of ordinary mortals, and yet happily no special greatness or superior moral excellence is necessary to discern and in some measure appreciate a truly great soul.
Douglass reflects on the nature of martyrdom and the recognition of great souls.
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No power beneath the sky can make an ignorant, wasteful, and idle people prosperous, or a licentious people happy.
None now denies the ability of the colored race to acquire knowledge of anything which can be communicated to the human understanding by letters.
The vote of the colored man, formerly beaten down and stamped out by intimidation, is now revived, sought, and defended by powerful allies, and this from no transient sentiment of the moment, but from the permanent laws controlling the…
The nation or people which shall comply with them will rise, and those which violate them will fall, and perhaps will disappear altogether.