I esteem myself a good, persistent hater of injustice and oppression, but my resentment ceases when they cease, and I have no heart to visit upon children the sins of their fathers.
Reflecting on a personal encounter, Douglass articulates his philosophy on justice and the limits of resentment.
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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.
None now denies the ability of the colored race to acquire knowledge of anything which can be communicated to the human understanding by letters.