Pathos In What To The Slave Is The Fourth Of July

Frederick Douglass, who spent twenty one years of his life as a slave, devised the speech, What to the Slave is the Fourth of July. In his speech, he acknowledges many of his viewpoints of what he thinks about the Fourth of July, along with what the slaves think as a whole about the Fourth of July. At the beginning of the speech he welcomes the audience and asks many rhetorical questions. Douglass’s first paragraph is innocent enough. However, he plunges into his second paragraph with harsh words and questions that demand an answer. Douglass’s speech screams anger and firmness. Not only does he use pathos to hook the audience’s emotions, for an emotional roller coaster ride, but also uses exceptional tone and figurative language. In Douglass’s speech, there are numerous examples of pathos. He uses phrases and words to grasp the reader’s/listener’s attention and emotion. “I hear the mournful wail of millions, whose chains, heavy and grievous..”, “bleeding children of this sorrow day”, and “hideous and revolting” are a few of the words and phrases that he used in his speech. Douglass charged his speech with pathos. Why would he do …show more content…
Slavery was filled with hatred and discrimination and Douglass did more than point that out in his speech. He adequately got his point across to his audience and essentially answered the question, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” Douglass depicted the day as a day of mockery, and hypocrisy. He said that the holiday was a sham. Why celebrate independence, when all of America is not free? I am sure that the emotional tension in the audience was fierce. However, that is not necessarily a bad thing. I think that Douglass wanted his his audience to feel what he felt. He wanted them to feel guilty about the actions of America. With a guilty audience, comes a crowd full of