I always felt uncomfortable, after having received anything in this way, for I feared that the giving me a few cents, might, possibly, ease his conscience, and make him feel himself a pretty honorable robber, after all!
In his autobiography, Douglass describes his discomfort with receiving partial wages, fearing it served to ease his master's conscience rather than acknowledge his rights.
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More from Frederick Douglass
I looked into this kitchen with peculiar interest, and remembered that it was there I last saw my mother.
We (the people of the North) are a charitable people, and in the excess of this feeling we were disposed to put the very best construction upon the strange behavior of our southern brethren.
True it is that this faith was many times shaken by passing events, but never destroyed.