With my knowledge of mechanics increased a
love of learning, which almost amounted to a passion. They said it
was against the law for a nigger to read; but I was raised so far
above black niggers that I didn't mind what the law said: so I got
'Pilgrim's Progress,' and the Bible, and 'Young's Night Thoughts,'
and from them I learned great truths: they gave me new hopes,
refreshed my weary soul, and made me like a new-clothed being ready
to soar above the injustice of this life. Oh, how I read them at
night, and re-read them in the morning, and every time found
something new in them, something that suited my case! Through the
sentiments imbibed from them I saw freedom hanging out its light of
love, fascinating me, and inciting me to make a death struggle to
gain it.
"One day, as I was thinking of my hard fate, and how I did all the
work and master got all the money for it-and how I had to live and
how he lived, master came in-looking good-natured. He approached
me, shook hands with me, said I was worth my weight in gold; and
then asked me how I would like to be free. I told him I would jump
for joy, would sing praises, and be glad all the day long.
"'Aint you contented where you are, Nicholas?' he enquired. I told
him I didn't dislike him; but freedom was sweetest. 'Give me a
chance of my freedom, master, and yet you may know me as a man,'
says I, feeling that to be free was to be among the living; to be a
slave was to be among the moving dead.
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