Oh! had I the ability, and could I reach the nation’s ear, I would to-day pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke.
Expressing his fervent desire to awaken the nation, Douglass articulates the powerful and harsh rhetoric he wishes he could unleash.
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More from Frederick Douglass
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.
He was called upon not merely to administer the government, but to decide, in the face of terrible odds, the fate of the Republic.
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.
Land is not worth much where there are no people to occupy it, and a mule is not worth much where there is no one to drive him.