“You’ll be free or die!”

Now I’ve been free, I know what a dreadful condition slavery is. I have seen hundreds of escaped slaves, but I never saw one who was willing to go back and be a slave.

Oh, Lord! You’ve been with me in six troubles, don’t desert me in the seventh!

I would fight for my liberty so long as my strength lasted, and if the time came for me to go, the Lord would let them take me.

We saw the lightning and that was the guns and then we heard the thunder and that was the big guns; and then we heard the rain falling and that was the blood falling; and when we came to get in the crops, it was dead men that we reaped.

I had two sisters carried away in a chain-gang – one of them left two children. We were always uneasy.

In my dreams and visions, I seemed to see a line, and on the other side of that line were green fields, and lovely flowers, and beautiful white ladies, who stretched out their arms to me over the line, but I couldn’t reach them no-how. I always fell before I got to the line.

If you are tired, keep going. If you are scared, keep going. If you are hungry, keep going. If you want to taste freedom, keep going.

If you hear the dogs, keep going. If you see the torches in the woods, keep going. If there’s shouting after you, keep going. Don’t ever stop. Keep going. If you want a taste of freedom, keep going.

Farewell, ole Maser, don’t think hard of me, I’m going on to Canada, where all the slaves are free.

Every great dream begins with a dreamer.

It wasn’t me, it was the Lord! I always told Him, ‘I trust to you. I don’t know where to go or what to do, but I expect You to lead me,’ and He always did.

I can’t die but once.

I said to the Lord, I’m going to hold steady on to you, and I know you will see me through.

I think slavery is the next thing to hell. If a person would send another into bondage, he would, it appears to me, be bad enough to send him into hell if he could.

The good Lord has come down to deliver my people, and I must go and help him.

God’s time is always near. He gave me my strength and he set the North Star in the heavens; He meant I should be free.

By the sword you did your work, and by the sword you die.

I don’t want to just die a normal death, I wanna be killed twice.

I am not afraid to die because I know that when we go, we will go together. It is living without you that would be unbearable.

150 people die every year from being hit by falling coconuts. Not to worry, drug makers are developing a vaccine.

A squirrel dying in front of your house may be more relevant to your interests right now than people dying in Africa.

I’m going to live forever. Geniuses don’t die.

If I relaxed, if I took my foot off the gas, I would probably die.

Each time we don’t say what we wanna say, we’re dying.