Rebellion Record: a Diary of American Events: Documents and Narratives, Volume 1.
Frank Moore, Ed.

[419] freedom from the control of his master, can exalt him to a higher moral and intellectual condition. You may give him physical liberty, but it will be only the liberty of indulgence in sloth and indolence — the liberty of gratification in animal passions and propensities. No human power can ever liberate his mind. It is enslaved .in the despotism of superstition and ignorance, of natural imbecility and inertness. It can never be elevated to the comprehension of the dignity and sublimity of that human liberty which, with all its imperfections and inferiority, approaches nearest to the liberty and power of God. He never can be exalted to that society and regulation of liberty which gives man his high place, his proud dominion on earth. Whether physically bond or free, mentally he must ever remain in bondage. He has animal courage as high and as fierce as the energy of the beast, when driven to desperation; but he is docile and submissive, with a moral timidity arising from his instinctive knowledge of natural inferiority, which makes him ever yield passive obedience to every reasonable will of his master. He looks on his master as a superior being, depends on him for instruction and direction in all things, and looks to him for support and protection. Though naturally indolent and improvident, he works cheerfully for his master (even without compulsion) much better than he does for himself. He feels himself identified with his master; he is interested in all that belongs to his master. He participates in his master's pride of reputation, fortune, and success. He prides himself on his master's position in society, rejoices with him in prosperity and happiness, and mourns with him, deeply and feelingly, in all his sorrows and afflictions. His heart is filled with the kindest affections, and there are few friendships among men more true and faithful than those of the African slave for a kind master. Those who have seen the unfeigned sorrow of the African nurse, watching over the dying child of her mistress, with anguish little less than the heart-rending affliction of the mother, those who have heard the lamentations, and seen the tears, of the slaves around the grave of the master, can want no higher proof of their fidelity and attachment. And under the civilizing and humane influence of the Christian religion, there are few communities of people of any race or color who would be more shocked and distressed, or who would shudder and shrink with greater horror and dismay from scenes of bloodshed and human suffering, than the African slaves of this country.

I am describing African slavery, not as fiction — not from fancy — but as I see and know it to exist--at least in some places. I have marked its condition and progress for many years, while living a plantation life, and I have seen with delight the continued progress of improvement in the condition of all slaves within my knowledge. And I have seen a development of capacity as it has advanced, for a yet higher improvement, which it must and will attain, with the progress of improvement in other institutions. In the description I have here given of African slavery and the African race, may be found the true reason why this black man is a slave in Africa, Asia, Europe, and America — the reason why he has ever been a slave, and the reason why he will ever remain a slave, so long as there is a superior race, willing to be his master. This is the reason why I sleep soundly with my doors unlocked, unbarred, unbolted, when my person is accessible to the midnight approach of more than two hundred African slaves. This is the reason why I feel security in knowing that if there should be danger, every slave would be a voluntary, faithful, and vigilant sentinel over my slumbers. And this is the reason why every slaveholder may sleep in the same manner, and with equal security, if the white man will not corrupt the virtue, or seduce the fidelity, of the faithful African slave. This general security from assault and violence is fully proven by the history of the slave in this country. There have, indeed, been some few individual cases of shocking murders of masters and overseers by slaves; but they are by no means so frequent, nor have they been marked by greater treachery and ferocity, than the murders committed by white men on both races within the same time. There should be no better evidence required of the fidelity and attachment of the slaves to their masters than the results developed in the mission of John Brown. For six months, without suspicion of his fiendlike treachery, he was domesticated among the slaves, and hospitable masters of Virginia, on the very border from which, in a few hours, they might have made successful escape. And when his bloody and horrible plans were all matured; when he thought it only necessary for him to strike, and all must fall; when he thought it only necessary for him to light the torch for the slaves to rise and burn alive their masters and mistresses, men, women, and children, while they slept, to his amazement, no slave rose against his master; and when he called John at midnight, (the faithful servant of Col. Washington,) when he told him he must fight, putting a murderous pike into his hands to butcher his master, the faithful African, in the virtues of humanity, civilization, and Christian charity, far above the devil who tempted his fidelity with the promise of freedom, reproved his hell-born tempter by the earnest inquiry, “On which side will Mass John fight? I want to be with him.” Never did treachery and depravity receive a more withering rebuke; never was fidelity better vindicated; never was human virtue more triumphant over damning, insidious temptation. But besides the security arising from the fidelity and attachment of the slave to the master, there is one which will ever be found in the total incapacity of the African mind to conceive