Frederick Douglass Quotations

Frederick Douglass

A gentleman will not insult me, and no man not a gentleman can insult me.

A man is worked upon by what he works on. He may carve out his circumstances, but his circumstances will carve him out as well.

A man without force, is without the essential dignity of humanity. Human nature is so constituted, that it cannot honor a helpless man, although it can pity him.

Experience proves that those are oftenest abused who can be abused with the greatest impunity. Men are whipped oftenest who are whipped easiest.

Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have the exact measure of the injustice and wrong which will be imposed on them.

Men may not get all they pay for in this world, but they certainly pay for all they get.

Neither charm nor patience nor endurance ever wrested power from those who hold it.

[T]he Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation's destiny... The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost.

Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the roar of its many waters.

You can tell the ideals of a nation by its advertisements.