Minnesota, 1884

File — Box: 4, Volume: 1

Identifier: II

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

Douglass taught school during the winter, worked on the family farm, attended Pillsbury Academy in Owatonna, and resumed teaching in November.

2 January--"Our lives are books. Each day a page is written, good or evil .... Perhaps it [this diary] will not be kept as diaries commonly are but I shall try to use it in the way it will be most beneficial. I want to record here the things that I need to remember or refer to. If I have learned anything during the day, I want to write it down to streangthen my memory. Thoughts and suggestions, plans and means with references to my work, articles written with view of having them published may be written here. Also my hopes & fears, and dangers, criticisms, short poems, and stanzas of longer ones, quotations, thoughts on religious subjects, etc. etc. In fact anything that I choose and consider beneficial."
5 June--"Went over to Freds store and sat a long time reading the newspaper . . . .It seems as though the moral foundation on which society rests is like the loose unstable sand .... Men were losing the morality as fast as they are gaining in the arts, invention and the sciences. Freedom and patriotism are dead. Love of money and love of pleasure are the craze of the age. No fit men can be placed at the head of the nation .... Virtuous men and chaste women are growing fewer and fewer. The only thing that could prevent this, it seems to me is faith in the Bible. People are passing out of superstition into infidelity. Men always go from one extreme to the other. They judge the Bible by their and their grandfathers opinion of it. It teaches what their grandfathers understood it to teach or nothing. It may take even greater knowledge of science than man yet have to understand its teachings perfectly. We can not judge it by present opinions relating to science that has not been fully established."

Dates

1884

Language of Materials

From the Collection: Collection materials are in English.

Conditions Governing Access

Twenty-four hour advanced notice encouraged. Materials must be used on-site. Access to parts of this collection may be restricted under provisions of state or federal law.