On the recordJanuary 1, 1855
Ignorance is a high virtue in a human chattel; and as the master studies to keep the slave ignorant, the slave is cunning enough to make the master think he succeeds.
Said by
Frederick Douglass
Source
gutenberg.orgIgnorance is a high virtue in a human chattel; and as the master studies to keep the slave ignorant, the slave is cunning enough to make the master think he succeeds.
Douglass describes the perverse value placed on ignorance for enslaved people and the subtle ways enslaved individuals navigate this oppressive system.
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For the moment the northern lamb was transformed into a lion, and his roar was terrible.
He was called upon not merely to administer the government, but to decide, in the face of terrible odds, the fate of the Republic.
The good to be sought and the evil to be shunned were flung in the balance and weighed against each other.
Treason had shot its poisonous roots deeper, and had spread its death-dealing branches further than any northern calculation had covered.