To this wonderful page in our country's history another more glorious still will be added, and the slave shall show at last to his free brothers a sharpened sword forged from the links of his fetters.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
The beautifully composed imagery of '12 Years a Slave' underscores the savagery of its subject, which is an American South not of knights and ladies but obscene values and a grotesque pageantry, every gorgeous shot of the languid landscape radiating toxicity like a hyperlush blossom that's poison to the touch.
The slave has but one master, the ambitious man has as many as there are persons whose aid may contribute to the advancement of his fortunes.
While we see the course of the final abolition of human slavery is onward, & we give it the aid of our prayers & all justifiable means in our power, we must leave the progress as well as the result in his hands who sees the end; who chooses to work by slow influences; & with whom two thousand years are but as a single day.
The great artist is a slave to his ideals.
Furthermore, the slaves cannot be put into a more wretched situation, ourselves being judges, and the community cannot take a more lively step to escape ruin, and obtain the smiles and protection of Heaven.
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.
In giving freedom to the slave, we assure freedom to the free - honorable alike in that we give and what we preserve. We shall nobly save, or meanly lose, the last best hope of earth.
The art of being a slave is to rule one's master.
Who covets more is evermore a slave.
I will to my dying day oppose, with all the powers and faculties God has given me, all such instruments of slavery on the one hand and villainy on the other as this Writ of Assistance is.