Pius Cruelty

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Frederick Douglass's journey, as documented in the Narrative of the Life of an American Slave, is one that not only faces societal and physical obstacles, it also deals with spiritual obstacles he must overcome to gain a holistic sense of freedom. The major spiritual obstacle that Douglass contends with repeatedly throughout the Narrative is deceptive trait of piety. However, the more Douglass comes in contact with the pious, through a keen sensitivity for understanding people's affect it becomes quite apparent to him that piety is negative quality for one to possess. In Narrative of the life of an American Slave, Frederick Douglass, through the use of various characters, literary symbols and techniques, depicts the piety as a poisonous quality that infects the heart of religious slaveholders making empathy for slaves impossible and justifying immensely cruel treatment of slaves. The city of St. Michael is a very important in the schematics of the Narrative, because it is clearly a metaphor for the falsity of piousness that Douglass encounters. St. Michael, simply by its name evokes ideas of holiness however this city posses little semblance to a holy place. The city of St. Michael is located in the county of Talbot County, which Douglass describes as being a place “that killing a slave, or any colored person is not a crime.. either by the courts or by the community” (40). Douglass then tells numerous of stories of slaves that were killed in the city of St. Michael including Mr. Gore's malicious murdering of Denby, Thomas Lanman's killing of two slaves, and Mrs. Hicks brutal murder of Douglass's wife's cousin (40). This oxymoronic combination of a city with such a sanctified name as St. Michael and the actual atrocity that... ... middle of paper ... ... of Edward Covey and Thomas Auld, Douglass reveals source his immensely deplorable connotation of the word piety. Works Cited Carter, J. Kameron. "Race, Religion, and the Contradictions of Identity: A Theological Engagement with Douglass's 1845narrative." Modern Theology 21.1 (2005): 37-65. Print. Douglass, Frederick. Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave. New York.Signet Classics, 2005. Print. Ferguson, SallyAnn H. "Christian Violence and the Slave Narrative." Duke University Press, 1996. 297. Vol. 68. Print Keller, Ralph A. "Methodist Newspapers and the Fugitive Slave Law: A New Perspective for the Slavery Crisis in the North." Church History 43.3 (1974): 319-39.JSTOR. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3163755 Matlack, James. "The Autobiographies of Frederick Douglass." Phylon (1960-) 40.1 (1979): 15- 28. Print.

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