“From apparently the basest metals we have the finest toned bells.” 

“Men talk of the Negro problem. There is no Negro problem. The problem is whether the American people have honesty enough, loyalty enough, honor enough, patriotism enough to live up to their Constitution” 

“To enslave men, successfully and safely, it is necessary to have their minds occupied with thoughts and aspirations short of the liberty of which they are deprived. A certain degree of attainable good must be kept before them.” 

“A man must be disposed to judge of emancipation by other tests than whether it has increased the produce of sugar,—and to hate slavery for other reasons than because it starves men and whips women,—before he is ready to lay the first stone of his anti-slavery life.” 

“One and God make a majority.” 

“Man's greatness consists in his ability to do and the proper application of his powers to things needed to be done.” 

“How do you feel," said a friend to me, "when you are hooted and jeered on the street on account of your color?" "I feel as if an ass had kicked, but had hit nobody," was my answer.” 

“To suppress free speech is a double wrong. It violates the rights of the hearer as well as those of the speaker. It is just as criminal to rob a man of his right to speak and hear as it would be to rob him of his money.” 

“My long-crushed spirit rose, cowardice departed, bold defiance took its place; and I now resolved that, however long I might remain a slave in form, the day had passed forever when I could be a slave in fact.” 

“We were both victims to the same overshadowing evil—she, as mistress, I, as slave.” 

“They attend with Pharisaical strictness to the outward forms of religion, and at the same time neglect the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith.” 

“They suppress the truth rather than take the consequence of telling it, and in so doing prove themselves a part of the human family.” 

“Once you learn to read, you'll be forever free.” 

“If there is no struggle there is no progress.” 

“For no man who lives at all lives unto himself. He either helps or hinders all who are in anywise connected to him.” 

“He was whipped oftener who was whipped easiest.” 

“Let us render the tyrant no aid; let us not hold the light by which he can trace the footprints of our flying brother.” 

“Experience is a keen teacher; and long before you had mastered your A B C, or knew where the "white sails" of the Chesapeake were bound, you began, I see, to gauge the wretchedness of the slave, not by his hunger and want, not by his lashes and toil, but by the cruel and blighting death which gathers over his soul.” 

“You are not judged by the height you have risen, but from the depth you have climbed.” 

“Slaves sing most when they are most unhappy. The songs of the slave represent the sorrows of his heart; and he is relieved by them, only as an aching heart is relieved by its tears.” 

“Slaves are generally expected to sing as well as to work.” 

“For of all slaveholders with whom I have ever met, religious slaveholders are the worst. I have ever found them the meanest and basest, the most cruel and cowardly, of all others.” 

“You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man.” 

“A man who will enslave his own blood, may not be safely relied on for magnamity.” 

“The songs of the slave represent the sorrows of his heart” 

“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. Give him a bad master, and he aspires to a good master; give him a good master, and he wishes to become his own master.” 

“I love the pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ: I therefore hate the corrupt, slaveholding, women-whipping, cradle-plundering, partial and hypocritical Christianity of this land.” 

“This will be seen by the fact, that the slaveholders like to have their slaves spend those days just in such a manner as to make them as glad of their ending as of their beginning. Their object seems to be, to disgust their slaves with freedom, by plunging them into the lowest depths of dissipation.” 

“and stature commanding and exact—in intellect richly endowed—in natural eloquence a prodigy—in soul manifestly "created but a little lower than the angels"—yet a slave, ay, a fugitive slave,—trembling for his safety, hardly daring to believe” 

“Should a slave, when assaulted, but raise his hand in self defense, the white assaulting party is fully justified by southern, or Maryland, public opinion, in shooting the slave down.” 

“Slavery blunts the edge of all our rebukes of tyranny abroad - the criticisms that we make upon other nations, only call forth ridicule, contempt, and scorn. In a word, we are made a reproach and a by-word to a mocking earth, and we must continue to be so made, so long as slavery continues to pollute our soil.” 

“Once you learn to read, you will be forever free.” 

“Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave.” 

“Some know the value of education by having it. I know it's value by not having it.” 

“The destiny of the colored American ... is the destiny of America.” 

“It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.” 

“Time is a game played beautifully by children.” 

“The Only Thing That Is Constant Is Change -” 

“The soul is dyed the color of its thoughts. Think only on those things that are in line with your principles and can bear the light of day. The content of your character is your choice. Day by day, what you do is who you become. Your integrity is your destiny - it is the light that guides your way.” 

“Nothing endures but change.” 

“Much learning does not teach understanding.” 

“Man's character is his fate.” 

“Whoever cannot seek the unforeseen sees nothing for the known way is an impasse.” 

“We are most nearly ourselves when we achieve the seriousness of the child at play.” 

“How can you hide from what never goes away?” 

“Wisdom is the oneness of mind that guides and permeates all things.” 

“Allow yourself to think only those thoughts that match your principles and can bear the bright light of day. Day by day, your choices, your thoughts, your actions fashion the person you become. Your integrity determines your destiny.” 

“It is in changing that we find purpose.” 

“Character is destiny” 

“The unlike is joined together, and from differences results the most beautiful harmony.”