They fancy themselves more generous and noble-hearted than the plain freemen, who labor for subsistence.
Editor's note · Context
Quincy comments on the self-perception of slaveholders compared to free laborers.
Share
More from Josiah Quincy
If there is a Bostonian who ever sailed from his own harbor for distant lands, or returned to it from them, without feelings, at the sight of the Blue Hills, which he is unable to express, his heart is differently constituted from mine.
If its operation should turn out more advantageous to them, it will be more honorable for us; and I never can object to entering formally into an obligation to do that which, upon every virtuous principle, ought to be done without it.
But circumstances will do more than any negotiation.
Adams surmised that it was owing to the indifference to his success of the leaders of the old Federal party, and remarked on the occasion, "This is among the thousand proofs how large a portion of Federalism is a mere fair-weather…





