Where I a pris'ner chain'd, scarce freely drawThe air imprison'd also, close and damp,Unwholsome draught; but here I feel amends,The breath of heav'n fresh blowing, pure and sweet,With day-spring born; here leave me to respire.Milton'sSampson Agonistes.

ABSTRICTED  (ABSTRI'CTED)   part. adj.[abstrictus, Lat.] Unbound.Dict.

When People talk of the Freedom of Writing, Speaking or thinking, I cannot choose but laugh. No such thing ever existed. No such thing now exists: but I hope it will exist. But it must be hundreds of years after you and I shall write and speak no more.

Essayist and philosopher Alain de Botton describes art as "an apothecary for the soul.

My long-crushed spirit rose, cowardice departed, bold defiance took its place; and I now resolved that, however long I might remain a slave in form, the day had passed forever when I could be a slave in fact.

This will be seen by the fact, that the slaveholders like to have their slaves spend those days just in such a manner as to make them as glad of their ending as of their beginning. Their object seems to be, to disgust their slaves with freedom, by plunging them into the lowest depths of dissipation.

You are loosed from your moorings, and are free; I am fast in my chains, and am a slave! You move merrily before the gentle gale, and I sadly before the bloody whip! You are freedom's swift-winged angels, that fly round the world; I am confined in bands of iron! O that I were free!

Geological trees do not flourish among slaves.

Once you learn to read, you'll be forever free. Knowledge makes a man unfit to be a slave.

I was suddenly and sharply interrupted by my good old friend Sojourner Truth with a question, Frederick, is God dead? No, I answered, and because God is not dead slavery can only end in blood.

Broken things are precious. We eat broken bread because we share in the depth of our Lord and His broken life. Broken flowers give perfume. Broken incense is used in adoration. A broken ship saved Paul and many other passengers on their way to Rome. Sometimes the only way the good Lord can get into some hearts is to break them.

Declaration of Independence: that all of our rights and liberties come to us from our Creator.