I have shown from the very constitution of a mob, the slight causes by which it may be created, and the sentiment by which it is impelled, it cannot be depended upon for either truth or justice.
Douglass critiques the mob mentality, asserting that mobs cannot be relied upon for justice or truth.
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True it is that this faith was many times shaken by passing events, but never destroyed.
For the moment the northern lamb was transformed into a lion, and his roar was terrible.
Father he might be, and not be husband, and could sell his own child without incurring reproach, if in its veins coursed one drop of African blood.
It was perhaps better for the country and for mankind that the good man could not know the end from the beginning.