"Virginia was never nearer emancipation than when General Turner kindled the fires of insurrection at Southampton."

"I did not run away from the South, I ran away from slavery."

"I have had but one idea for the last three years, to present the Negro as a man, and to demand his rights as a man."

"John Brown's zeal in the cause of freedom was infinitely superior to mine. Mine was as the taper light; his was as the burning sun. I could live for the slave; John Brown could die for him."

"I prefer to be true to myself, even at the hazard of incurring the ridicule of others, rather than to be false, and to incur my own abhorrence."