Whether or not Frederick Douglass framed these exact words, the spirit of the line distills his ethic: anger is a combustible resource that must be engineered into ascent. Rather than burn where we stand, we build rungs—purpose, discipline, and solidarity—and then climb. In this framing, anger is not the destination but the ignition; its moral test is whether it carries more people into light than it leaves in smoke. With that premise, Douglass’s life reads like a manual for conversion of heat into lift. [...]
