Brendan Thiele Thiele 1

Miss Burke

English 11 - American Literature

December 18, 2017

Persuasive Essay

There was a slave. Like many famous and successful people in society over the history of time,

this slave was not held back from the rules and laws that had been established to prevent people in his

position in society from advancing. Moreover, this particular slave, as one of those special people that

only come along every so often in society, was relentlessly determined that he would carve his own path

no matter the consequences, risks and challenges along his life’s journey. The person was a man who

was identified by the name of Frederick Douglas. Frederick Douglas once said, “if there is no struggle,

there is no progress.” Only in retrospect, when reviewing the significance of his actions in his life, is it

abundantly clear that his quote was his personal internal governing mission statement that guided this

man’s life no matter the consequences or obstacles that presented themselves to Frederick Douglas in

his lifetime. It is overwhelmingly evident that Frederick Douglas, like many great people in society, was

only able to achieve great accomplishments because he was one of those rare people willing to embrace

his personal struggles throughout his life, he then learned from those struggles, and then successfully

demonstrated the tremendous accomplishments that can be achieved only by a person willing to risk

their life, and only through such actions did he achieve great progress.

Frederick Douglas as a slave was not permitted to read or write. This was a struggle. The

consequences for willfully violating this Master’s rule could be the penalty of death. A person who was
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a slave could be killed if they violated this cardinal rule. Frederick Douglas personally struggled to

escape the jaws of ignorance and worked hard to find a way to read and write. He was not able to go to

school or have instructors show him and teach him how to read. It was a tremendous struggle for Mr.

Douglas of not knowing how to read and he struggled to teach himself secretly under the constant

threat that if caught teaching himself to read and write he could be killed. The fact of his life of knowing

that he, and other slaves, were not permitted to read or write, only made him have a stronger desire to

achieve this life’s goal so he and other slaves could make progress towards education and freedom in

society. Mr. Douglas once said, “I lived in Master Hugh’s family about seven years. During this time, I

succeeded in learning to read and write. I had no teacher.” Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas An

American Slave, Chapter VII, Page 51. Mr. Douglas also said, as stated in his autobiography, “Very soon

after I went to live with Mr. and Mrs. Auld, she commenced to teach me A,B,C and learning to spell

words. Mr. Auld forebode Mrs. Auld to instruct me further and it was unlawful to teach a slave to read.”

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas An American Slave, Chapter VII, page 48. Mr. Douglas

embraced the opportunities to learn and become self-taught for the purpose and opportunity for

progress.

Mr. Frederick Douglas was determined to escape his life of slavery. He tried to escape multiple

times and repeatedly failed in his efforts. His repeated attempts to escape continually resulted in brutal

painful punishment. His continuous attempts to escape slavery each time resulting in extreme torcher

depicts his strong internal drive and desire to overcome challenges. He had goals and continuously

struggled to achieve the goals for progress to escape the life of slavery. Eventually he succeeded. In

effort to escape, Mr. Douglas disguised himself as a sailor wearing a red shirt in his efforts to conceal his

identify as a slave when escaping. He also taught himself to disguise his voice and make himself sound

like a sailor by the way he spoke. The struggle for freedom helped lead to the eventual progress of
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freedom. He learned from the risks the risks he took in life, and his survival enabled him to help other

blacks and slaves. He stated “if there is no struggle, there is no progress.” The freemen and people of

the north did not have the same luxuries of the slave owners. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas

An American Slave, page 116. Also, after asking Master Hughs for a new type of payment, at first he was

resistant. But, he then gave in and granted the request to Mr. Douglas’ risky and dangerous request.

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas An American Slave, page 109. The repeated struggles to

escape and achieve freedom ultimately resulted in progress for Mr. Douglas.

The struggles of Mr. Douglas is comparable to the struggles of slaves in the world then and the

world today. The slaves of today, through the efforts of people like Mr. Douglas, have laws to protect

their freedoms; however, they are held against their will. In today’s world, there are approximately

12,000,000 men, women and children in slavery. Amnesty International Slavery Today,

Amnestyinternational.org. Where slaves were and are being brought to America for slave trade,

ultimately they were and are immigrants in a new, brutally harsh living environment. However, as

evidence exclusive of the autobiography book of Frederick Douglas shows, the struggle of immigrants

often depicts the same theory of Douglas being that without the pain of struggle, there can often be no

progress of freedom and individual rights. Some Immigrants see learning English as an ethical

obligation. Most do not have command of English when immigrating to America. This concept supports

the main idea of Mr. Douglas as a person dedicated to struggling to achieve progress. When Mr.

Douglas struggles to escape, and struggles to learn to read and write, he is overcoming the barriers to

individual freedom and the language barrier in the same fashion as most immigrants. These personal

sacrifices were and are painful struggles to achieve progress. Modern Slavery – Human Rights Watch,

www.hrw.org.
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In conclusion, only with the struggles of Mr. Douglas, there could have been no progress for him

or the people in his position in society. His life is an example of his quoted concept, if there is no

struggle, there is no progress. Mr. Douglas made great progress as a slave through his continuous

struggles. Mr. Douglas taught himself to read and write and ultimately escaped slavery. As a person, as

a slave, as a person of African immigrant descent, he struggled to achieve the goals of literacy as well as

personal freedom. Mr. Douglas’ life leaves a lasting impression that if you can imagine for one minute

the struggles he faced on a daily basis, he was a person of tremendous strength in his mind and his

body. Mr. Douglas made great strides as a human, as a slave and he demonstrated that only through

embracing his struggles and persevering for his goals did he achieve his freedom and success of literacy.
 Works Cited

“Amnestyinternational.org.” Amnestyinternational.org, www.amnestyinternational.org/.

Douglas, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass. Signet Classics, 1997
“About.” Human Rights Watch, 17 Jan. 2017, www.hrw.org/about.