Frederick Douglass, the Orator - Monroe County Library System

Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County · Historic Monographs Collection
LIFE OF FREDERICK DOUGLASS. IOt
what would become of his inferiority. Yet he is
a thing, in American estimate. He is the chattel
of some pale-faced tyrant. How his owner would
cower and shiver to hear him thunder in an antislavery
hall! How he would shrink away, with
his infernal whip, from his flaming eye when kindled
with anti-slavery emotion! And the brotherhood
of thieves, the posse comitatus of divines, we
wish a hecatomb or two of the proudest and flintiest
of them were obliged to hear him thunder
for human liberty and lay the enslavement of his
people at their doors. They would tremble like
Belshazzar."
Of his early speeches here is an eloquent extract
upon
"MAN'S RIGHTS TO LIBERTY.
" Indeed, I ought to state, what must be obvious
to all, that, properly speaking, there is no such
thing as new truth ; for truth, like the God whose
attribute it is, is eternal. In this sense, there is,
indeed, nothing new under the sun. Error may
be properly designated as old or new, since it is
but a misconception; or an incorrect view of the
truth. Misapprehensions of what truth is have
their beginnings and their endings. They pass
away as the race move onward. But truth is
•from everlasting to everlasting,' and can never
pass away.