Quotes about Slavery

Thousands of years ago, weren't we capable of building enormous structures like the pyramids?  Weren't we capable of worshiping gods, weaving, making fire, finding lovers and wives, sending written messages?  Of course we were.  But although we've succeeded in replacing slaves with wage slaves, all the advances we've made have been in the field of science.  Human beings are still asking the same questions as their ancestors.  In short, they haven't evolved at all.

The world of employer and employee, like that of master and slave, debases both.

America My Country: last nation on earth to abolish human slavery; first of all nations to drop the nuclear bomb on our fellow human beings.

The choice people have to make is never between slavery and freedom.   We will always have to choose between slavery and the unknown.

It is profoundly tragic that I am a slave, but it is profoundly joyous that I am God's slave, not that of a devil.

A fundamental condition of Being is slavery. Man is the slave of God, and God that of His vanity.

All slave labor is forced labor. So are all forms of labor where an individual has not got the educational or fiscal means to stand on his own in making a free contract with an employer, or where that capitalist has acquired the political and social as well as the economic clout to prevent evenhanded terms from being respected. What passes for the rational legal concept of a "contract" is unknown in American conditions of fact, for the vast majority of cases: most people hire their own labor out under conditions of duress, and the employer one-sidedly dictates the terms. That is how we got to a condition where the minimum wage for the working poor is not a living wage, and is getting worse and worse. Modernity is not more civilized than antiquity because it has legally abolished slavery; it is merely more modernized in recognizing that it is far, far cheaper and more prudent to rent slaves by the hour than to own them, which means you have to assume responsibility for their upkeep and care.

Today, nobody sees, or wishes to see, that in our time the enslavement of the majority of men is based on money taxes, levied on land and otherwise, which are collected by government from the subjects.

Planning other people’s actions means to prevent them from planning for themselves, means to deprive them of their essentially human quality, means enslaving them.

If you liked school, you're gonnnnna lovvvvve work!

Money is a new form of slavery, and distinguishable from the old simply by the fact that it is impersonal - that there is no human relation between master and slave.

At times some people use force or fraud to take from others without willful, voluntary consent. Normally, the initiation of force to take life is murder, to take liberty is slavery, and to take property is theft. It is the same whether these actions are done by one person acting alone, by the many acting against a few, or even by officials with fine hats and titles.

Freedom is like birth. Till we are fully free, we are slaves.

Most humans know their own "reason" only in the sense that Hume defined it, as "a slave to the passions"--and by "passions" he meant not moral passions or the passions of transcendent genius, but only low appetites or base desires, which society and economy ultimately shape and spur on in us.

Disobedience is the true foundation of liberty. The obedient must be slaves.

Of all God's creatures there is only one that cannot be made the slave of the lash; that one is the cat. If man could be crossed with the cat, it would improve man, but it would deteriorate the cat.

My first instinct was to get a job—an idea immediately followed by a crippling wave of nausea. I literally vomited in a trashcan on the sidewalk where I’d been pleasantly window-shopping. I found the idea of a job repulsive. Life was too short to waste being a productive member of society. My job was my imaginary life, and I felt deeply I should be paid to live it.

To question what you learn is freedom, to learn without question is slavery.

Well, children, where there is so much racket there must be something out of kilter. I think that 'twixt the negroes of the South and the women at the North, all talking about rights, the white men will be in a fix pretty soon. But what's all this here talking about?

That man over there says that women need to be helped into carriages, and lifted over ditches, and to have the best place everywhere. Nobody ever helps me into carriages, or over mud-puddles, or gives me any best place! And ain't I a woman? Look at me! Look at my arm! I have ploughed and planted, and gathered into barns, and no man could head me! And ain't I a woman? I could work as much and eat as much as a man - when I could get it - and bear the lash as well! And ain't I a woman? I have borne thirteen children, and seen most all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And ain't I a woman?

Then they talk about this thing in the head; what's this they call it? [member of audience whispers, "intellect"] That's it, honey. What's that got to do with women's rights or negroes' rights? If my cup won't hold but a pint, and yours holds a quart, wouldn't you be mean not to let me have my little half measure full?

Then that little man in black there, he says women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wasn't a woman! Where did your Christ come from? Where did your Christ come from? From God and a woman! Man had nothing to do with Him.

If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down all alone, these women together ought to be able to turn it back , and get it right side up again! And now they is asking to do it, the men better let them.

Obliged to you for hearing me, and now old Sojourner ain't got nothing more to say.

Man! The most complex of creatures, and for this reason the most dependant of creatures. On everything that has formed you, you may depend. Do not balk at this apparent slavery….a debtor to many, you pay for your advantages by the same number of dependencies. Understand that independence is a form of poverty; that many things claim you, that many also claim kinship with you.

There is no such thing as slow freedom. Freedom is like a birth. Till we are fully free we are slaves. All birth takes place in a moment.

Rehearse death. To say this is to tell a person to rehearse his freedom. A person who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave. He is above, or at any rate, beyond the reach of, all political powers.

For men in a state of freedom had thatch for their shelter, while slavery dwells beneath marble and gold.

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

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.

A Briton even in love should be A subject, not a slave!

BRUTUS: Be patient till the last. Romans, countrymen, and lovers! hear me for my cause, and be silent, that you may hear: believe me for mine honour, and have respect to mine honour, that you may believe: censure me in your wisdom, and awake your senses, that you may the better judge. If there be any in this assembly, any dear friend of Caesar's, to him I say, that Brutus' love to Caesar was no less than his. If then that friend demand why Brutus rose against Caesar, this is my answer: - Not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved Rome more. Had you rather Caesar were living and die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live all free men? As Caesar loved me, I weep for him; as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it; as he was valiant, I honour him: but, as he was ambitious, I slew him. There is tears for his love; joy for his fortune; honour for his valour; and death for his ambition. Who is here so base that would be a bondman? If any, speak; for him have I offended. Who is here so rude that would not be a Roman? If any, speak; for him have I offended. Who is here so vile that will not love his country? If any, speak; for him have I offended. I pause for a reply.

Good name in man and woman, dear my lord, Is the immediate jewel of their souls; Who steals my purse steals trash; 'tis something, nothing; 'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to thousands; But he that filches from me my good name Robs me of that which not enriches him, And makes me poor indeed.

Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves.

Necessity is the excuse for every infringement of human freedom. It is the argument of the tyrant and the creed of the slave.