Yet even when Douglass is the slave of a good white woman who treats him well physically by satisfying his bodily appetite for food and he is "better off in the regard" that he always has bread with him, unlike "many of the poor white children in the neighborhood," he does not regard himself as a happy child and envies the free white boys. In fact, "I used to bestow upon the hungry littler urchins," this bread of slavery, for the poor white boys, "in return, would give me that more valuable bread of knowledge."(1898, Chapter IIV)

Beasts can eat, but only human beings can think and learn. After Douglass gains literary knowledge, "I envied by fellow-slaves for their stupidity. I have often wished myself a beast. I preferred the condition of the meanest reptile to my own. (1899, Chapter IIV)

But slaves true higher nature that they possess as...
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