QuoteProject
Talk of the abuses of slavery! Humbug! The thing itself is the essence of all abuse!
Harriet Beecher Stowe
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Harriet Beecher Stowe emphasizes that slavery itself is a fundamental abuse, rendering discussions of its abuses irrelevant.

In this quote, Harriet Beecher Stowe argues that the institution of slavery is inherently abusive, negating the need to discuss its specific abuses. By labeling slavery as 'the essence of all abuse,' she underscores the moral outrage against the practice, suggesting that any secondary discussions about its horrors fall short of addressing the core immorality of enslaving individuals.

Themes

SlaveryAbuseMoralityFreedomJustice

In practice

Example use cases

During a lecture on human rights, one might quote Stowe to highlight the fundamental immorality of slavery.

More from Harriet Beecher Stowe

To be really great in little things, to be truly noble and heroic in the insipid details of everyday life, is a virtue so rare as to be worthy of canonization.
Harriet Beecher StoweRead
What's your hurry?" Because now is the only time there ever is to do a thing in," said Miss Ophelia.
Harriet Beecher StoweRead
So much has been said and sung of beautiful young girls, why doesn't somebody wake up to the beauty of old women.
Harriet Beecher StoweRead
It is generally understood that men don't aspire after the absolute right, but only to do about as well as the rest of the world.
Harriet Beecher StoweRead
Death! Strange that there should be such a word, and such a thing, and we ever forget it; that one should be living, warm and beautiful, full of hopes, desires and wants, one day, and the next be gone, utterly gone, and forever!
Harriet Beecher StoweRead
Once, in an age, God sends to some of us a friend who loves in us, not a false imagining, an unreal character, but, looking through all the rubbish of our imperfections, loves in us the divine ideal of our nature, β€” loves, not the man that we are, but the angel that we may be.
Harriet Beecher StoweRead

Similar quotes

I wonder if we are all wrong about each other, if we are just composing unwritten novels about the people we meet?
Rebecca WestRead
If we are to survive, our loyalties must be broadened further, to include the whole human community, the entire planet Earth.
Carl SaganRead
homesickness is just a state of mind for me. i'm always missing someone or someplace or something, i'm always trying to get back to some imaginary somewhere. my life has been one long longing.
Elizabeth WurtzelRead
No charter of freedom will be worth looking at which does not ensure the same measure of freedom for the minorities as for the majority.
Mahatma GandhiRead
I was Catholic. You talk about a minority within a minority within a minority: a black Catholic in Savannah, GA.
Clarence ThomasRead
Secrecy involves a tension which, at the moment of revelation, finds its release.
Georg SimmelRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.