He is whipped oftenest, who is whipped easiest; and that slave who has the courage to stand up for himself against the overseer, although he may have many hard stripes at the first, becomes, in the end, a freeman, even though he sustain the formal relation of a slave.
Douglass asserts that resistance, despite initial suffering, ultimately leads to a form of inner freedom for the enslaved, contrasting with the fate of the submissive.
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More from Frederick Douglass
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.
We could not but believe that there existed at the South a latent and powerful Union sentiment which would assert itself at last.
A son of toil himself, he was linked in brotherly sympathy with the sons of toil in every loyal part of the republic.