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Slavery Quotes

Browse 2495 quotes about Slavery.

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Slavery Quotes

“No revolution can ever succeed as a factor of liberation unless the MEANS used to further it be identical in spirit and tendency with the PURPOSES to be achieved. Revolution is the negation of the existing, a violent protest against man's inhumanity to man with all the thousand and one slaveries it involves. It is the destroyer of dominant values upon which a complex system of injustice, oppression, and wrong has been built up by ignorance and brutality. It is the herald of NEW VALUES, ushering in a transformation of the basic relations of man to man, and of man to society.”

MenMeanHas BeensUsedSpiritPurposeValuesIgnoranceRevolutionThousandSucceedBuiltRelationTransformationSlaveryComplexesInjusticeViolentTendenciesFactorsOppressionLiberationProtestDominantIdenticalBrutalityDestroyersInhumanityNegationComplex SystemsInhumanity To Man
Author:Emma Goldman
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“Human nature is full of riddles; . . . one of those riddles is: how is it that people who have been crushed by the sheer weight of slavery and cast to the bottom of the pit can nevertheless find strength in themselves to rise up and free themselves first in spirit and then in body while those who soar unhampered over the peaks of freedom suddenly lose the taste of freedom, lose the will to defend it, and, hopelessly confused and lost, almost begin to crave slavery?'”

PeopleFirstsHumansHas BeensBodySpiritLostLosesHuman NatureTasteWeightSlaveryBottomCastsConfusedSheerNeverthelessSoarCravePitsCrushedRiddleFinding StrengthLost And Confused
Author:Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
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“I learned a history not then written in books but one passed from generation to generation on the steps of moonlit porches and beside dying fires in one-room houses, a history of great-grandparents and of slavery and of the days following slavery; of those who lived still not free, yet who would not let their spirits be enslaved.”

StillsBookSpiritHouseRoomsStepsHistoryFireWrittenGenerationsDyingSlaveryFollowingGrandparentPorchGreat Grandparents
Book:Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry (Puffin Modern Classics)
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“To dine, drink champagne, raise a racket and make speeches about the people's consciousness, the people's conscience, freedom andso forth while servants in tails are scurrying around your table, just like serfs, and out in the severe cold on the street await coachmen--this is the same as lying to the holy spirit.”

PeopleSpiritLyingConsciousnessStreetsColdDrinkHolySpeechConscienceRaisesTablesSlaveryServantHoly SpiritHypocrisyTailsSevereChampagneRacketDineSerfs
Author:Anton Chekhov
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“Whether happiness or unhappiness, freedom or slavery, in short whether good or evil results from an improved environment depends largely upon how the change has been brought about, upon the methods by which the physical results have been reached, and in what spirit and for what purpose the fruits of that change are used. Because a higher standard of living, a greater productiveness and a command over nature are not good in and of themselves does not mean that we cannot make good of them, that they cannot be a source of inner strength.”

MeanDoeHas BeensUsedSpiritPurposeEvilResultsEnvironmentGreaterSourceDependsHigherStandardsMethodSlaveryFruitCommandInner StrengthUnhappinessStandards Of LivingHigher Standards
Author:David Lilienthal
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“What I'm slowly realizing is that I believe that most of us felt that we could relax a little bit after November 2, 2008, because of the progress and the spirit that it took to get Barack Obama in The White House. And what we didn't realize, is that was really the beginning. That was really the beginning of the struggle and not the end of a struggle, to come from colonial times through slavery, through the Jim Crowe Laws, through the civil rights period to The White House as, like a point A/point B journey. Point B of course being the end.”

BelieveLittlesEndsLawSpiritCoursesHouseI BelieveFeltBitsRealizingWhiteStruggleRightsProgressJourneyPeriodsLittle BitSlaveryCivil RightsBarackRelaxWhite HouseNovemberJim CrowColonial Times
Author:Questlove
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“Our spirits have their own private way of understanding each other, of becoming intimate, while our external persons are still trapped in the commerce of ordinary words, in the slavery of social rules. Souls have their own needs and their own ambitions, which the body ignores when it sees that it's impossible to satisfy them or achieve them.”

WayNeedsPersonsStillsSoulBodySpiritSocialUnderstandingImpossibleAchieveBecomingAmbitionOrdinarySlaveryIntimateTrappedCommerceUnderstanding Each Other
Book:The late Mattia Pascal
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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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“Your late purchase of an estate in the colony of Cayenne, with a view to emancipating the slaves on it, is a generous and noble proof of your humanity. Would to God a like spirit would diffuse itself generally into the minds of the people of this country; but I despair of seeing it.”

PeopleMindCountrySpiritHumanityViewsSeeingDespairLateSlaverySlaveNobleProofGenerousEstatesColony
Book:Writings: Being His Correspondence, Addresses, Messages, and Other Papers, Official and Private, Selected and Published from the Original Manuscripts
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“From my earliest recollection, I date the entertainment of a deep conviction that slavery would not always be able to hold me within its foul embrace; and in the darkest hours of my career in slavery, this living word of faith and spirit of hope departed not from me, but remained like ministering angels to cheer me through the gloom. This good spirit was from God, and to him I offer thanksgiving and praise.”

AbleSpiritHoursCareersOffersAngelPraiseSlaveryEmbraceEntertainmentConvictionCheerFoulRecollectionGloomHold MeDepartedDarkest Hour
Book:Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave
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“I was broken in body, soul, and spirit. My natural elasticity was crushed, my intellect languished, the disposition to read departed, the cheerful spark that lingered about my eye died; the dark night of slavery closed in upon me; and behold a man transformed into a brute!”

MenSoulBodyEyeSpiritNightNaturalDarkBrokenDiedSlaveryIntellectNarrativeSparksTransformedDispositionCheerfulCrushedBrutesDepartedDark NightElasticityBody Soul And Spirit
Book:Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave
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“It was a glorious resurrection, from the tomb of slavery, to the heaven of slavery. 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.”

LongFactsMightFormSpiritHeavenForeverSlaveryRoseSlaveNarrativeGloriousCowardiceResurrectionCrushedTombsDefianceDepartedBe A Slave
Book:Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave
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