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Slavery Quotes

Browse 2495 quotes about Slavery.

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Slavery Quotes

“The greatest secret of monarchic rule...is to keep men deceived and to cloak in the specious name of religion the fear by which they must be checked, so that they will fight for slavery as they would for salvation, and will think it not shameful, but a most honorable achievement, to give their life and blood that one man may have a ground for boasting.”

ThinkingMenGivingMayFightingNamesSecretBloodAchievementSlaverySalvationOne ManHonorableBoastDeceivedShamefulCloaks
Author:Baruch Spinoza
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“Like slavery and apartheid, poverty is not natural. It is man-made and it can be overcome and eradicated by the actions of human beings. Overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity. It is an act of justice... Sometimes it falls upon a generation to be great. You can be that great generation. Let your greatness blossom.”

MenHumansMadeSometimesActionFallNaturalJusticeHuman BeingsInspiringPovertyGenerationsGreatnessTasksOvercomingSlaveryCharityHumanitarianApartheid
Author:Nelson Mandela
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“This is the most immediate fruit of exile, of uprooting: the prevalence of the unreal over the real. Everyone dreamed past and future dreams, of slavery and redemption, of improbable paradises, of equally mythical and improbable enemies; cosmic enemies, perverse and subtle, who pervade everything like the air.”

RealDreamPastEnemyAirSlaveryFruitRedemptionParadiseSubtleCosmicExileUnrealImprobableFuture DreamsUprooting
Book:If this is a Man: Remembering Auschwitz
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“The Bible may, indeed does, contain a warrant for trafficking in humans, for ethnic cleansing, for slavery, for bride-price, and for indiscriminate massacre, but we are not bound by any of it because it was put together by crude, uncultured human mammals.”

HumansMayDoeMotivationalTogetherReligionAtheismSlaveryBoundsAtheistBridesCrudeCleansingWarrantsMassacresEthnic CleansingMammalsTraffickingGod Is Not GreatSubtle Atheist
Book:God is Not Great
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“The battle, Sir, is not to the strong alone; it is to the vigilant, the active, the brave. Besides, Sir, we have no election. If we were base enough to desire it, it is now too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery! Our chains are forged! Their clanking may be heard on the plains of Boston! The war is inevitable; and let it come! I repeat, Sir, let it come!”

IfsMayWarEnoughDesireStrongPresidentHeardRevolutionBattleLateElectionSlaveryBraveActiveChainsInevitableRepeatsToo LateRetiringRetreatContestsSubmissionBostonAmerican RevolutionVigilantForged
Author:Patrick Henry
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“How many demons and people are enslaved here? (Jericho) Define slavery. (Asmodeus) Kept against their will. (Jericho) Good definition. Counting me? (Asmodeus) Why not? (Jericho) Probably a couple of million…you know it’s really hard to count to a million, plus they’re always dying and new ones are coming in. I tried to count once, but it got really depressing so I stopped. The constant adding and subtracting. Not my forte, really. (Asmodeus)”

PeopleKnowsHardMillionsDyingCoupleSlaveryConstantDefinitionsDemonPlusWhy NotDepressingCountingJerichoForteReally DepressingAsmodeus
Author:Sherrilyn Kenyon
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“It is in vain, sir, to extenuate the matter. Gentlemen may cry, “Peace! Peace!” — but there is no peace. The war is actually begun! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! Our brethren are already in the field! Why stand we here idle? What is it that gentlemen wish? What would they have? Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty, or give me death!”

KnowsLifeGivingMayWarMatterAmericaCoursesNextWishPeaceLibertyCryFieldsSweetArmsEarsGive MeSlaveryDearChainsVainGentlemanPatriotismAlmightyIdleBad AssClashBrethrenAlmighty GodGaleGreat Patriotic
Author:Patrick Henry
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“I add my oath of protection to the bone,' he said in a whisper. 'To you now and to any child you may bear in the future. I would trade no day I spend with you for a life of safe slavery. I accepted the post of Seeker of my own free will. And if Darken Rahl takes the whole world into madness, then we will die with a sword in our hands, not chains on our wings. We will not allow it to be easy for them to kill us; they will pay a high price. We will fight with our last breath if need be, and in our death, let us inflict a wound on him that will fester until it claims him.”

IfsWorldNeedsMayChildrenSaidWholeHandsLastsDiesFightingEasyMy OwnPayBearsSafeClaimsMadnessBreathsSlaveryTradeWingsAddBonesProtectionAcceptedWoundsWhole WorldChainsPostsFree WillSeekersOathHigh Prices
Book:Wizard's First Rule
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“…“white supremacy” is a much more useful term for understanding the complicity of people of color in upholding and maintaining racial hierarchies that do not involve force (i.e slavery, apartheid) than the term “internalized racism”- a term most often used to suggest that black people have absorbed negative feelings and attitudes about blackness. The term “white supremacy” enables us to recognize not only that black people are socialized to embody the values and attitudes of white supremacy, but we can exercise “white supremacist control” over other black people.”

PeopleFeelingsUsedValuesForceUnderstandingBlackTermWhiteAttitudeColorExerciseRacismNegativeSlaveryBlack PeopleWhite SupremacyMaintainingHierarchyApartheidBlacknessSupremacyComplicityNegative Feelings
Author:Bell Hooks
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“Be faithful, be vigilant, be untiring in your efforts to break every yoke, and let the oppressed go free. Come what may - cost what it may - inscribe on the banner which you unfurl to the breeze, as your religious and political motto - "NO COMPROMISE WITH SLAVERY! NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS”

MayPoliticalReligiousEffortBreakCostSlaveryUnionsCompromiseFaithfulOppressedMottoBreezeBannerBeing FaithfulVigilantYokeNo CompromiseSlaveholders
Author:William Lloyd Garrison
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“I know there is a God, and that He hates injustice and slavery. I see the storm coming, and I know that his hand is in it. If He has a place and work for me - and I think He has - I believe I am ready.”

IfsThinkingKnowsBelieveHandsAmericaHateI BelieveReadySlaveryInjusticeStormStorms Coming
Book:The Lincoln encyclopedia: the spoken and written words of A. Lincoln arranged for ready reference
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“I never heard weeping like that before or after; not from a child, nor a man wounded in the palm, nor a tortured man, nor a girl dragged off to slavery from a taken city. If you heard the woman you most hate in the world weep so, you would go to comfort her. You would fight your way through fire and spears to reach her. And I knew who wept, and what had been done to her, and who had done it.”

IfsMenWorldWayChildrenDoneHateGirlFightingCitiesTakenFireHeardComfortSlaveryWoundedPalmsWeepingSpears
Author:C. S. Lewis
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“I have told the story I was asked to tell. I have closed it, as so many stories close, with a joining of two people. What is one man's and one woman's love and desire, against the history of two worlds, the great revolutions of our lifetimes, the hope, the unending cruelty of our species? A little thing. But a key is a little thing, next to the door it opens. If you lose the key, the door may never be unlocked. It is in our bodies that we lose or begin our freedom, in our bodies that we accept or end our slavery. So I wrote this book for my friend, with whom I have lived and will die free.”

PeopleIfsMenWorldMayLittlesTwoBookEndsStoriesBodyDesireDiesNextLosesAcceptingDoorsRevolutionKeysMy FriendsSlaveryLifetimeSpeciesCrueltyOne ManLittle ThingsJoiningOne WomanUnendingTwo Worlds
Author:Ursula K. Le Guin
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“Oh, Black known and unknown poets, how often have your auctioned pains sustained us? Who will compute the lonely nights made less lonely by your songs, or by the empty pots made less tragic by your tales? If we were a people much given to revealing secrets, we might raise monuments and sacrifice to the memories of our poets, but slavery cured us of that weakness.”

PeopleIfsInspirationalMadeMightPainNightSongGivenBlackMemoriesSecretKnownSacrificePoetWeaknessLonelyEmptyRaisesSlaveryTalesTragicPotRevealingMonumentLonely Nights
Author:Maya Angelou
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“I have observed this in my experience of slavery, - that whenever my condition was improved, instead of its increasing my contentment, it only increased my desire to be free, and set me to thinking of plans to gain my freedom. I have found that, to make a contented slave, it is necessary to make a thoughtless one. It is necessary to darken his moral and mental vision, and, as far as possible, to annihilate the power of reason. He must be able to detect no inconsistencies in slavery; he must be made to feel that slavery is right; and he can be brought to that only when he ceased to be a man.”

ThinkingMenFeelsMadeReasonAbleDesireFoundMoralVisionPlansConditionsGainsSlaverySlaveContentmentBe A ManInconsistency
Book:Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
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“Choose your leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears. To be led by a fool is to be led by the opportunists who control the fool. To be led by a thief is to offer up your most precious treasures to be stolen. To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies. To be led by a tyrant is to sell yourself and those you love into slavery.”

LyingAsksLeaderFoolOffersSlaverySellsTreasureLiarsCowardControlledTyrantsThievesStolenOpportunistForethoughtThose You Love
Book:Parable of the Talents
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“Gilbert darling, don't let's ever be afraid of things. It's such dreadful slavery. Let's be daring and adventurous and expectant. Let's dance to meet life and all it can bring to us, even if it brings scads of trouble and typhoid and twins!" (Anne to Gilbert)”

IfsTroubleSlaveryDaringTwinsDarlingAdventurousTyphoidAnne Of Windy Poplars
Book:ANNE SHIRLEY Complete Series - ALL 14 Books in One Volume: Anne of Green Gables, Anne of Avonlea, Anne of the Island, Rainbow Valley, The Story Girl, Chronicles of Avonlea and more: Including the Memoirs & Letters of Lucy Maud Montgomery
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“If no one had ever challenged religious authority, there’d be no democracy, no public schools, women’s rights, improvements to science and medicine, evolution of slavery and no laws against child abuse or spousal abuse. I was afraid to challenge my religious beliefs because that was the basis of creation—mine anyway. I was afraid to question the Bible or anything in it, and when I did, that’s when I became involved with PFLAG and realized that my son was a perfectly normal human being and there was nothing for God to heal because Bobby was perfect just the way he was.”

IfsWayHumansChildrenSchoolLawBeliefChallengesReligiousHuman BeingsPerfectDemocracyRightsCreationMinesSonEvolutionInvolvedAuthorityNormalAbuseBasesSlaveryMedicineImprovementHealMy SonChild AbuseWomens RightsPublic SchoolReligious BeliefPerfectly Normal
Author:Mary Griffith
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“I am not a 'democrat' only because 'humility' and equality are spiritual principles corrupted by the attempt to mechanize and formalize them, with the result that we get not universal smallness and humility, but universal greatness and pride, till some Orc gets hold of a ring of power--and then we get and are getting slavery.”

SpiritualResultsPrinciplesGreatnessHumilityPrideUniversalSlaveryDemocratRingsSmallnessOrcs
Book:The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien
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“From my spirit's gray defeat, From my pulse's flagging beat, From my hopes that turned to sand Sifting through my close-clenched hand, From my own fault's slavery, If I can sing, I still am free. For with my singing I can make A refuge for my spirit's sake, A house of shining words, to be My fragile immortality.”

IfsStillsI CanHandsSpiritHouseMy OwnBeatsSingingSlaveryShiningFaultsSakeDefeatImmortalitySandGrayFragileRefugePulseSifting
Book:Love Songs
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