The Narrative of Sojourner Truth Quotes

“Let others say what they will of the efficacy of prayer, I believe in it, and I shall pray. Thank God! Yes, I shall always pray,”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth

“Where there is so much racket, there must be something out of kilter”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth

“After turning it in her mind for some time, she came to the conclusion, that she had been taking part in a great drama, which was, in itself, but one great system of robbery and wrong. 'Yes,' she said, 'the rich rob the poor, and the poor rob one another.' True, she had not received labor from others, and stinted their pay, as she felt had been practised against her; but she had taken their work from them, which was their only means to get money, and was the same to them in the end. For instance–a gentleman where she lived would give her a dollar to hire a poor man to clear the new-fallen snow from the steps and side-walks. She would arise early, and perform the labor herself, putting the money into her own pocket. A poor man would come along, saying she ought to have let him have the job; he was poor, and needed the pay for his family. She would harden her heart against him, and answer–'I am poor too, and I need it for mine.' But, in her retrospection, she thought of all the misery she might have been adding to, in her selfish grasping, and it troubled her conscience sorely; and this insensibility to the claims of human brotherhood, and the wants of the destitute and wretched poor, she now saw, as she never had done before, to be unfeeling, selfish and wicked.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth

“Many slaveholders boast of the love of their slaves. How would it freeze the blood of some of them to know what kind of love rankles in the bosoms of slaves for them! Witness the attempt to poison Mrs. Calhoun, and hundreds of similar cases. Most 'surprising ' to every body, because committed by slaves supposed to be so grateful for their chains.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: Including Her Speech Ain't I a Woman?

“Through all the scenes of her eventful life may be traced the energy of a naturally powerful mind—the fearlessness and child-like simplicity of one untrammelled by education or conventional customs—purity of character—an unflinching adherence to principle—and a native enthusiasm, which, under different circumstances, might easily have produced another Joan of Arc. With all her fervor, and enthusiasm, and speculation, her religion is not tinctured in the least with gloom. No doubt, no hesitation, no despondency, spreads a cloud over her soul; but all is bright, clear, positive, and at times ecstatic. Her trust is in God, and from him she looks for good, and not evil. She feels that ‘perfect love casteth out fear.”
― Sojourner Truth, Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Bondswoman of Olden Time, with a History of Her Labors and Correspondence Drawn from Her Book of Life

“Oh Lord,' inquired Isabella, 'what is this slavery, that it can do such dreadful things? what evil can it not do?' Well may she ask, for surely the evils it can and does do, daily and hourly, can never be summed up, till we can see them as they are recorded by him who writes no errors, and reckons without mistake.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: Including Her Speech Ain't I a Woman?

“Yes,' she said, 'the rich rob the poor, and the poor rob one another.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: Including Her Speech Ain't I a Woman?

“he was soon drawn into a circle of associates who did not improve either his habits or his morals.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth

“As we were walking the other day, she said she had often thought what a beautiful world this would be, when we should see every thing right side up. Now, we see every thing topsy-turvy, and all is confusion.”
― Sojourner Truth, Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Bondswoman of Olden Time, with a History of Her Labors and Correspondence Drawn from Her Book of Life

“In heartening contrast to our own “culture of complaint,” in which the idea of human solidarity seems lost in the clamor of victim groups competing for attention and entitlement, Sojourner Truth grew to understand that her personal quest for freedom was meaningful only as a moment in a larger struggle against the burden of injustice.”
― Sojourner Truth, Narrative of Sojourner Truth: A Bondswoman of Olden Time, with a History of Her Labors and Correspondence Drawn from Her Book of Life

“absurdity of the claims so arrogantly set up by the masters, over beings designed by God to be as free as kings; and at the perfect stupidity of the slave, in admitting for one moment the validity of these claims.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth

“Think you, dear reader, when that day comes, the most 'rapid abolitionist' will say-'Behold, I saw all this while on the earth?' Will he not rather say, 'Oh, who has conceived the breadth and depth of this moral malaria, this putrescent plague-spot?' Perhaps the pioneers in the slave's cause will be as much surprised as any to find that with all their looking, there remained so much unseen.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: Including Her Speech Ain't I a Woman?

“her unwavering confidence in an arm which she believed to be stronger than all others combined could have raised from her sinking spirit.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth

“All who eat swine’s flesh are of the devil; and just as certain as he eats it, he will tell a lie in less than half an hour. If you eat a piece of pork, it will go crooked through you, and the Holy Ghost will not stay in you, but one or the other must leave the house pretty soon. The pork will be as crooked in you as ram’s horns, and as great a nuisance as the hogs in the street.”
― Sojourner Truth, Narrative of Sojourner Truth

“And a'n't, I a woman? I have borne thirteen chilern, and seen 'em mos' all sold off to slavery, and when I cried out with my mother's grief, none but Jesus heard me! And a'n't I a woman?”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: Including Her Speech Ain't I a Woman?

“Den dat little man in black dar, he say women can't have as much rights as men, 'cause Christ wan't a woman! Whar did your Christ come from?" Rolling thunder couldn't have stilled that crowd, as did those deep, wonderful tones, as she stood there with outstretched arms and eyes of fire. Raising her voice still louder, she repeated, "Whar did your Christ come from? From God and a woman!”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: Including Her Speech Ain't I a Woman?

“If de fust woman God ever made was strong enough to turn de world upside down all alone, dese women togedder (and she glanced her eye over the platform) ought to be able to turn it back, and get it right side up again! And now dey is asking to do it, de men better let 'em.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth: Including Her Speech Ain't I a Woman?

“Such an abominable state of things is silently tolerated, to say the least, by slaveholders - deny it who may. And what is that religion that sanctions, even by its silence, all that is embraced in the 'Peculiar Institution'? If there can be any thing more diametrically opposed to the religion of Jesus, than the working of this soul-killing system - which is as truly sanctioned by the religion of America as are her ministers and churches - we wish to be shown where it can be found.”
― Sojourner Truth, The Narrative of Sojourner Truth