When I think of antiquity, the detail that frightens me is that those hundreds of millions of slaves on whose backs civilization rested generation after generation have left behind them no record whatever. We do not even know their names. In the whole of Greek and Roman history, how many slaves’ names are known to you? I can think of two, or possibly three. One is Spartacus and the other is Epictetus. Also, in the Roman room at the British Museum there is a glass jar with the maker’s name inscribed on the bottom, “Felix fecit.” I have a vivid mental picture of poor Felix (a Gaul with red hair and a metal collar round his neck), but in fact he may not have been a slave; so there are only two slaves whose names I definitely know, and probably few people can remember more. The rest have gone down into utter silence.
George Orwell (1903-1950) English journalist, essayist, writer [pseud. of Eric Arthur Blair]
Essay (1942-08), “Looking Back on the Spanish War, ch. 4, Such, Such Were the Joys, essay 8 (1953)
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Quotations about:
enslaved
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I have always thought that all men should be free; but if any should be slaves it should be first those who desire it for themselves, and secondly those who desire it for others. Whenever [I] hear any one arguing for slavery I feel a strong impulse to see it tried on him personally.
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) American lawyer, politician, US President (1861-65)
Speech (1865-03-17) to the 104th Indiana Regiment, Indianapolis
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Lincoln was speaking on reports that Confederate Army was drafting Black slaves to fight in their ranks. The above is the text from Lincolns autograph draft, and is most well known. The draft includes the words (scratched out) "any one arguing for slavery, even a preacher, I feel ...."
See also Lincoln (1854).
The following version was from newspaper reports the next day in the New York Herald and New York Tribune:While I have often said that all men ought to be free, yet I would allow those colored persons to be slaves who want to be; and next to them those white persons who argue in favor of making other people slaves. (Applause.) I am in favor of giving an opportunity to such white men to try it on for themselves.
The "arguing for slavery" quote was mentioned in a speech by Jimmy Carter before the Indian Parliament (1978-01-02), in the context of those wealthy people who say that democracy is of no value to the poor.
