How we cite our quotes: (Sentence)
Quote #1
But all this prejudice sinks into insignificance in my mind, when compared with the enormous iniquity of the system which is its cause—the system that sold my four sisters and my brothers into bondage—and which calls in its priests to defend it even from the Bible! The slaveholding ministers preach up the divine right of the slaveholders to property in their fellow-men. (30-31)
So prejudice is bad, says Douglass. But it's not as bad as slavery. They're not even in the same ballpark of bad. Slavery may be the cause of prejudice, but make no mistake, it's way worse. Slavery is so bad, says Douglass, that slaveholders have to get their ministers to constantly say it's not.
Pro tip: If you constantly have to talk about how not really all that bad something is, it might be, uh, bad.
Quote #3
"Look at your hard, horny hands—see how nicely they are adapted to the labor you have to perform! Look at our delicate fingers, so exactly fitted for our station, and see how manifest it is that God designed us to be His thinkers, and you the workers—Oh! the wisdom of God!" (38-39)
People love to blame their own prejudices on God, a point Douglass makes in this speech and in many other places in his writings.
God designed slavery? To quote our beloved Holden Caulfield, Jesus would've probably puked at this idea.
Quote #4
—he could pray at morning, pray at noon, and pray at night; yet he could lash up my poor cousin by his two thumbs, and inflict stripes and blows upon his bare back, till the blood streamed to the ground! all the time quoting scripture, for his authority, and appealing to that passage of the Holy Bible which says, "He that knoweth his master's will, and doeth it not, shall be beaten with many stripes!" Such was the amount of this good Methodist's piety. (42-43)
The quote is from Luke 12:47, and (no surprise) it's not talking about American slavery. The "master" of the quote refers to God, not the Southern slaveholder. But hey, nothing like putting yourself in God's place so you can beat the crap out of another of God's children and still feel good about yourself. This is a good lesson in not taking quotes out of context.
Repeat after Shmoop: "I will not take quotes out of context. Ever."