Frederick Douglass
"The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers. I could regard them in no other light than a band of successful robbers, who had left their homes, and gone to Africa, and stolen us from our homes, and in a strange land reduced us to slavery. I loathed them as being the meanest as well as the most wicked of men. As I read and contemplated the subject, behold! that very discontentment which Master Hugh had predicted would follow my learning to read had already come, to torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish. As I writhed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy. it opened my eyes to the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out. in moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their stupidity. I have often wished myself a beast. I preferred the condition of the meanest reptile to my own. Any thing, no matter what, to get rid of thinking! It was this everlasting thinking of my condition that tormented me. There was no getting rid of it. It was pressed upon me by every object within sight or hearing, animate or inanimate. The silver trump of freedom had roused my soul to eternal wakefulness. Freedom now appeared, to disappear no more forever. It was heard in every sound and seen in every thing. It was ever present to torment me with a sense of my wretched condition. I saw nothing without seeing it, I heard nothing without hearing it, and felt nothing without feeling it. It looked from every star, it smiled in every calm, breathed in every wind, and moved in every storm."
49 Quotes
"The more I read, the more I was led to abhor and detest my enslavers. I could regard them in no other light than a band of successful robbers, who had left their homes, and gone to Africa, and stolen us from our homes, and in a strange land reduced us to slavery. I loathed them as being the meanest as well as the most wicked of men. As I read and contemplated the subject, behold! that very discontentment which Master Hugh had predicted would follow my learning to read had already come, to torment and sting my soul to unutterable anguish. As I writhed under it, I would at times feel that learning to read had been a curse rather than a blessing. It had given me a view of my wretched condition, without the remedy. it opened my eyes to the horrible pit, but to no ladder upon which to get out. in moments of agony, I envied my fellow-slaves for their stupidity. I have often wished myself a beast. I preferred the condition of the meanest reptile to my own. Any thing, no matter what, to get rid of thinking! It was this everlasting thinking of my condition that tormented me. There was no getting rid of it. It was pressed upon me by every object within sight or hearing, animate or inanimate. The silver trump of freedom had roused my soul to eternal wakefulness. Freedom now appeared, to disappear no more forever. It was heard in every sound and seen in every thing. It was ever present to torment me with a sense of my wretched condition. I saw nothing without seeing it, I heard nothing without hearing it, and felt nothing without feeling it. It looked from every star, it smiled in every calm, breathed in every wind, and moved in every storm."
"كلما توغلت في القراءة، ازداد كرهي وبغضي لمن استعبدوني. لم أعد أرى فيهم سوى زمرة من اللصوص الظافرين، الذين غادروا أوطانهم، وارتادوا أفريقيا ليسلبونا من ديارنا، ثم استعبدونا في أرض غريبة. كنت أمقتهم لدناءتهم المتناهية وشرهم المستطير.
وبينما كنت أقرأ وأتأمل في هذا الأمر، إذا بذلك السخط الذي تنبأ به السيد هيو إثر تعلمي القراءة قد حلّ بالفعل، ليعذب روحي ويغرز أنيابه فيها، في ألم لا يوصف. وفيما كنت أتلوى تحت وطأة هذا الشعور، كان يخالجني أحياناً أن تعلم القراءة كان نقمة لا نعمة. لقد كشف لي عن بؤسي دون أن يمنحني سبيلاً للخلاص، وفتح عيني على الهاوية المروعة، لكن دون سلم أتسلق به للخروج منها.
في لحظات عذابي، كنت أحسد رفاقي العبيد على غبائهم. وكم تمنيت لو كنت بهيمة، بل فضلت حال أحقر الزواحف على حالي. أي شيء، مهما كان، لأتخلص من التفكير! فلقد كان هذا التفكير الدائم في حالتي هو ما يعذبني، ولم يكن منه مفر. كان يفرض نفسه عليّ من خلال كل ما يقع تحت بصري أو سمعي، حياً كان أم جماداً.
لقد أيقظ بوق الحرية الفضي روحي إلى يقظة أبدية. وبدت الحرية الآن، لتستقر ولا تغيب أبداً. كانت تُسمع في كل صوت وتُرى في كل شيء، حاضرةً أبداً لتعذبني بإحساسي بوضعي البائس. لم أرَ شيئاً إلا ورأيتها تتجلى فيه، ولم أسمع صوتاً إلا وسمعتها تتردد فيه، ولم أشعر بشيء إلا وشعرت بها. كانت تطل من كل نجم، وتشرق في كل سكون، وتتنفس في كل ريح، وتضطرب في كل عاصفة."
Frederick Douglass
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
"America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future."
"أمريكا خائنة لماضيها، خائنة لحاضرها، وتلزم نفسها بجدية أن تكون خائنة لمستقبلها."
Frederick Douglass
"I am a Republican, a black, dyed in the wool Republican, and I never intend to belong to any other party than the party of freedom and progress."
"أنا جمهوري، جمهوري أصيل حتى النخاع، ولن أنتمي أبدًا لأي حزب آخر سوى حزب الحرية والتقدم."
Frederick Douglass
"Without a struggle, there can be no progress."
"لا تقدم بلا كفاح."
Frederick Douglass
"If there is no struggle, there is no progress."
"إن لم يكن صراع، فلا تقدم."
Frederick Douglass
"Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet deprecate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground."
"إن الذين يزعمون أنهم يؤيدون الحرية، وفي الوقت نفسه يستنكرون التحريض، هم أناس يريدون المحاصيل دون حرث الأرض."
Frederick Douglass
"When men sow the wind it is rational to expect that they will reap the whirlwind."
"عندما يزرع المرء الريح، فمن المنطقي أن يحصد العاصفة."
Frederick Douglass
"Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground."
"إن الذين يدّعون حب الحرية، ثم يستهينون بالتحريض، هم رجال يريدون حصادًا دون حرث الأرض."
Frederick Douglass
"A battle lost or won is easily described, understood, and appreciated, but the moral growth of a great nation requires reflection, as well as observation, to appreciate it."
"إن وصف معركة خاسرة أو منتصرة وفهمها وتقديرها أمر يسير، أما النمو الأخلاقي لأمة عظيمة فيتطلب التأمل والملاحظة معًا لتقديره حق قدره."
Frederick Douglass
"One and God make a majority."
"الواحد مع الله يشكلان أغلبية."
Frederick Douglass
"At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed."
"في مثل هذا الوقت، نحتاج إلى سخرية لاذعة، لا إلى حجة مقنعة."
Frederick Douglass
"I prayed for twenty years but received no answer until I prayed with my legs."
"صليت عشرين عامًا فلم أجد إجابة،"
Frederick Douglass
"A little learning, indeed, may be a dangerous thing, but the want of learning is a calamity to any people."
"إن قليل العلم قد يكون خطراً حقاً، أما انعدامه فهو مصيبة تحل بأي أمة."
Frederick Douglass
"The soul that is within me no man can degrade."
"الروح التي تسكنني لا يملك إنسان أن يحط من قدرها."
Frederick Douglass
"It is not light that we need, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake."
"ليس النور ما نحتاج، بل النار؛ وليس الودق الهين، بل الرعد. إننا بحاجة إلى العاصفة، الزوبعة، والزلزال."
Frederick Douglass
"We have to do with the past only as we can make it useful to the present and the future."
"ليس لنا من الماضي إلا ما نصنع منه نفعًا لحاضرنا ومستقبلنا."
Frederick Douglass
"[A] woman should have every honorable motive to exertion which is enjoyed by man, to the full extent of her capacities and endowments. The case is too plain for argument. Nature has given woman the same powers, and subjected her to the same earth, breathes the same air, subsists on the same food, physical, moral, mental and spiritual. She has, therefore, an equal right with man, in all efforts to obtain and maintain a perfect existence."
"ينبغي للمرأة أن تحظى بكل دافع شريف للكدح، مما يتمتع به الرجل، وذلك إلى أقصى مدى تسمح به قدراتها ومواهبها. إن القضية أوضح من أن تحتاج إلى جدال. لقد وهبت الطبيعة المرأة ذات القوى، وأخضعتها لذات الأرض، تتنفس ذات الهواء، وتقتات على ذات الطعام، جسدياً وأخلاقياً وعقلياً وروحياً. لذا، فإن لها حقاً مساوياً للرجل في جميع المساعي الرامية إلى بلوغ وجود كامل والمحافظة عليه."
Frederick Douglass
"There is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven, that does not know that slavery is wrong for him."
Frederick Douglass
"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!"
Frederick Douglass
"The silver trump of freedom had roused my soul to eternal wakefulness."
Frederick Douglass
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