Gerrit Smith Quotes

We must continue to judge of slavery by what it is, and not by what you tell us it will, or may be.

When a good man lends himself to the advocacy of slavery, he must, at least for a time, feel himself to be any where but at home, amongst his new thoughts, doctrines, and modes of reasoning.

But as well may you, when urging a man up-hill with a heavy load upon his back, and with your lash also upon his back, tell him, that be has nothing to do either with the load or the lash.

Truth and mercy require the exertion - never the suppression, of man's noble rights and powers.

But I love honesty, and, therefore; do I make great account of facts.

I do not object to the construction of rail roads and canals.

True liberty acknowledges and defends the equal rights of all men, and all nations.

God cannot approve of a system of servitude, in which the master is guilty of assuming absolute power - of assuming God's place and relation towards his fellow-men.

To no human charter am I indebted for my rights.

My rights all spring front an infinitely nobler source - from favor and grace of God.

I welcomed the organization of the Anti-slavery Society.

Our political and constitutional rights, so called, are but the natural and inherent rights of man, asserted, carried out, and secured by modes of human contrivance.

There is one class of men, whom it especially behoves to be tenacious of the right of free discussion. I mean the poor.

It is manifestly vital to the success of the anti-slavery cause, that the authority and influence of proslavery, especially of slaveholding, ministers should be destroyed.

I trust, that your readers will not construe my words to mean, that I would not have gone to a 3 o'clock in the morning session, for the sake of defeating the Nebraska bill.

The Southern slave would obey God in respect to marriage, and also to the reading and studying of His word. But this, as we have seen, is forbidden him.

Our concern, however, is with slavery as it is, and not with any theory of it.

I need say no more, to prove that slavery is entirely unlike the servitude in the patriarchal families.

The only ground on which a neutral State can claim respect at the hands of belligerents is, that, so far as she is concerned, their rights are protected.

There is room in our ranks for the old and decrepit, as well as the young and vigorous.

It, sometimes, suits the slaveholders to claim, that their slavery is an exclusively State concern; and that the North has, therefore, nothing to do with it.

True, permanent peace can never be restored, until slavery, the occasion of the war, has ceased.

I believe that government is for the use of the people, and not the people for the use of the government.

To say, that Capt. Ingraham violated the rights of Turkey, is nonsense.

But, although America cannot be justly charged with violating the rights of Turkey, Turkey nevertheless can be justly charged with violating the rights of America.

I am a plain man, and I care and know comparatively little about rhetoric.

I prefer, in a word, the republican system, because it comes up more nearly to God's system.