Frederick Douglass’s connection to the British Enlightenment. Via David Henderson and David Beito, here is an excerpt from a letter Douglass wrote on November 17, 1864: “The old doctrine that the slavery of the black, is essential to the freedom of the white race, can maintain itself only in the presence of slavery, where interest […]
Frederick Douglass and Adam Smith Read More »
Wisdom from a giant of the nineteenth-century — Frederick Douglass (c. 1818-1895): “Everybody has asked the question … ‘What shall we do with the Negro?’ I have had but one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us! Your doing with us has already played the mischief with us. Do nothing with us! If the
Frederick Douglass and self-respect Read More »
I’m re-reading some biographical material on Kant, the great counter-Enlightenment philosopher of Königsberg. (Apparently, the crooked-timber house that Kant lived in early in his career was subject to vandalism. A sublime and phenomenal critique of the critiquer.) With one exception, Professor Kant had no pictures hanging on the walls of his house. Kant had been
Immanuel Kant, portraiture, and I Read More »
In a letter to his former master, Frederick Douglass explains his decision to escape from slavery: “The morality of the act, I dispose as follows: I am myself; you are yourself; we are two distinct persons, equal persons. What you are, I am. You are a man, and so am I. God created both, and
Frederick Douglass and Ayn Rand Read More »
An open letter Douglass wrote in 1848 to Thomas Auld, his former master, on the tenth anniversary of his escape from slavery to freedom. (A 350-word excerpt is here.) TO MY OLD MASTER. Thomas Auld, Sir: The long and intimate, though by no means friendly, relation which unhappily subsisted between you and myself, leads me
Frederick Douglass’s letter to his former master Read More »
In this week of the Atlas Intellectualls course on Slavery we cover Frederick Douglass’s “To My Old Master.” Douglass had escaped slavery and become a leader of the abolitionist movement by the time he wrote this 1848 public letter to Thomas Auld—on the anniversary of his escape. Douglass describes his experiences as a slave, his
Frederick Douglass, “To My Old Master” [Atlas Intellectuals] Read More »