If, then, the slaves were, in fact, instigated to leave their master’s possession, the probabilities are a thousand to one that they were so instigated by some other person or persons resident here, and not by the prisoner.

With increased intelligence and mental development, the desires natural to manhood spring up;--the longing for liberty, and for the possession of free agency; the desire of selecting one’s own field of labor, and means of enjoyment; the…

So that, as the value of a slave increases, the strength of the tenure by which he is held becomes less secure.

In this capital of a nation so boastful of its freedom, the common air is vocal with the accents of liberty.

Who knows but some of them have read the Declaration of American Independence; and, in their blindness and simplicity of mind, applied its immortal truths to themselves?

All men are created equal!” and among their “inalienable rights” “are life, LIBERTY, and the pursuit of happiness!” Who knows but that they may have seen these doctrines, with a constellation of names subscribed to them as glorious as any…

If such ideas once got possession of a man’s mind, do you think that fire or water could ever burn them or drown them out?

Those who cannot read, can hear; and if you are to keep from them the perpetually recurring sights and sounds which must awaken the quick instincts of liberty, you must extinguish their eyes, and seal up their ears in everlasting silence.

I reiterate, then, if slaves are property, they are a peculiar kind of property.

They are instinct with the common desires of humanity, and among them one of the deepest and strongest is the love of liberty.

And just in proportion as their value is increased by intelligence and development, just in that proportion is the bond weakened by which they are held.

If they hear this, and are above the condition of brutes, they will apply it to themselves.

Every Fourth of July oration, if understood, is a torch to light up another St.

Hence there is the broadest and most striking difference between stealing and malicious mischief.

If one man takes the property of another, merely to destroy or annihilate it, out of ill will or revenge towards the owner, this is malicious mischief only, and not stealing.

But this impulse which prompts to the destruction of another man’s property is vastly weaker than that which leads to its appropriation.

The latter is gratified a thousand times where the former is once, and therefore the law visits the former with the milder penalty.

In my return back through the passage, I heard the same words repeated twice over, and looking up, I saw it was a starling, hung in a little cage. ‘I can’t get out, I can’t get out,’ said the starling.

I stood looking at the bird, and to every person who came through the passage, it ran fluttering to the side which they approached, with the same lamentation of its captivity,--‘I can’t get out,’ said the starling.

God help thee! said I, but I’ll let thee out, cost what it will; so I turned about the cage to get at the door.

No tint of words can spot thy snowy mantle, or chemic power turn thy sceptre into iron.

With thee to smile upon him as he eats his crust, the swain is happier than his monarch, from whose court thou art exiled.

Gracious Heaven! grant me but health, thou great Bestower of it, and give me but this fair goddess as my companion, and shower down thy mitres, if it seems good unto thy divine providence, upon those heads which are aching for them.

These slaves, by the law of nature, were as free as you or I.

So far from facilitating the increase of individual or national wealth, slavery retards both.