Beat and cuff your slave, keep him hungry and spiritless, and he will follow the chain of his master like a dog; but, feed and clothe him well—work him moderately—surround him with physical comfort—and dreams of freedom intrude.
Douglass analyzes the psychological effects of different treatments of enslaved people, arguing that improved conditions paradoxically awaken the desire for true freedom.
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But we are not here to applaud manly courage, save as it has been displayed in a noble cause.
The father might be a white man, glorying in the purity of his Anglo-Saxon blood, and his child ranked with the blackest slaves.
It was in the air, and men breathed it and were permeated by it, often when they were quite unconscious of its presence.