Slave Quotes

• I think the person who takes a job in order to live - that is to say, for the money - has turned himself into a slave.

  Joseph Campbell

  Birthday, Money, Jobs

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• A man is no less a slave because he is allowed to choose a new master once in a term of years.

  Lysander Spooner

  Freedom, Men, Years

  Lysander Spooner (1973). “No Treason and a Letter to Thomas F. Bayard”

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  I don't think the people of the slave states will ever consider the subject of slavery in its true light till some other argument is resorted to other than moral persuasion.

  John Brown

  Thinking, Light, People

  John Brown (1910). “The Life and Letters of John Brown, Liberator of Kansas and Martyr of Virginia”

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• The worst thing about slavery is that the slaves eventually get to like it.

  Aristotle

  Slavery, Worst, Worst Things

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• The greatest slave is not he who is ruled by a despot, great though that evil be, but he who is in the thrall of his own moral ignorance, selfishness, and vice.

  Samuel Smiles

  Ignorance, Evil, Selfishness

  Samuel Smiles (1873). “Self-help; with Illustrations of Character, Conduct, and Perseverance”, p.19

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• As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Wisdom, Freedom, Humor

  "Definition of Democracy," ca. 1 Aug. 1858

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• I didn't know I was a slave until I found out I couldn't do the things I wanted.

  Frederick Douglass

  Slavery, Found, Wanted

  "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave". Book by Frederick Douglass, 1845.

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• The art of being a slave is to rule one's master.

  Diogenes

  Art, Slavery, Masters

  Herakleitos, Diogenes (2011). “Herakleitos and Diogenes: Translated from the Greek by Guy Davenport”, p.42, Wipf and Stock Publishers

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• I believe that it is better to tell the truth than to lie. I believe that it is better to be free than to be a slave. And I believe that it is better to know than be ignorant.

  H. L. Mencken

  Inspirational, Nature, Truth

  "What I Believe". The Forum Magazine, Issue 84 (p. 139), September 1930.

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• Nobody had ever instructed him that a slave-ship, with a procession of expectant sharks in its wake, is a missionary institution, by which closely-packed heathen are brought over to enjoy the light of the Gospel.

  Harriet Beecher Stowe

  Slave Ships, Light, Sharks

  Harriet Beecher Stowe (1982). “Uncle Tom's Cabin, Or, Life Among the Lowly ; The Minister's Wooing ; Oldtown Folks”, p.530, Library of America

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• Freedom means you are unobstructed in living your life as you choose. Anything less is a form of slavery.

  Wayne Dyer

  Life, Motivational, Memorial Day

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• The real names of our people were destroyed during slavery. The last name of my forefathers was taken from them when they were brought to America and made slaves, and then the name of the slave master was given, which we refuse, we reject that name today and refuse it. I never acknowledge it whatsoever.

  Malcolm X

  Real, Taken, Names

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• I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit together at the table of brotherhood.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Dream, Kings, Son

  Speech at Civil Rights March,Washington, D.C., 28 Aug. 1963

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• Slavery takes hold of few, but many take hold of slavery.

  Seneca the Younger

  Inspirational, Slavery, Human Trafficking

  "Biography/ Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Slavery is an institution for converting men into monkeys.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Men, Slavery, Monkeys

  Ralph Waldo Emerson, Alfred R. Ferguson (1965). “Journals and Miscellaneous Notebooks of Ralph Waldo Emerson, Volume V: 1835-1838”, p.295, Harvard University Press

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• It's as if all identity has been stolen from them, except their identity as slaves.

  Kevin Bales

  Identity, Slavery, Stolen

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• Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Freedom, 4th Of July, Patriotic

  Letter to Henry L. Pierce and Others, 6 Apr. 1859

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• Slaves lose everything in their chains, even the desire of escaping from them.

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Escaping, Desire, Slavery

  Jean Jacques Rousseau (2015). “The Social Contract”, p.88, Jean Jacques Rousseau

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• The slave is doomed to worship time and fate and death, because they are greater than anything he finds in himself, and because all his thoughts are of things which they devour.

  Bertrand Russell

  Death, Time, Fate

  Bertrand Russell (2016). “Mysticism and Logic”, p.85, Bertrand Russell

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• Those who will not reason, are bigots, those who cannot, are fools, and those who dare not, are slaves.

  Lord Byron

  Inspirational, Doubt, Atheism

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• Talk about slavery! It is not the peculiar institution of the South. It exists wherever men are bought and sold, wherever a man allows himself to be made a mere thing or a tool, and surrenders his inalienable rights of reason and conscience. Indeed, this slavery is more complete than that which enslaves the body alone.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Men, Rights, Judging

  "Complete Works of Henry David Thoreau".

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• In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Congress And The President, Giving, Civil War

  Annual Message to Congress, 1 Dec. 1862

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• Practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back

  John Maynard Keynes

  Believe, Men, Air

  The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money bk. 6, ch. 24 (1936)

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• It cannot in the opinion of His Majesty's Government be classified as slavery in the extreme acceptance of the word without some risk of terminological inexactitude.

  Winston Churchill

  Acceptance, Government, Risk

  Speech in House of Commons, 22 Feb. 1906

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• Captivity is the greatest of all evils that can befall one.

  Miguel de Cervantes

  Evil, Captivity, Slavery

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