"There is nothing more precious to Man than the freedom of his being."

• Text written by the French abolitionist deputy Auguste François Perrinon.
• In French.
• One page.
• 26.2 cm x 37.5 cm.
• Paris, July 6, 1850.
• Excellent condition of conservation.
  

Portuguese translation

There is nothing more precious to Man than the freedom of his being. No sacrifice should cost him anything to conquer it, when it has been stolen from him. If the Negroes have been slaves for so long, it is because their eyes have been blinded by ignorance, to prevent them from reading this truth in all the places where it is written, and because the feeling of their strength and their right has been stifled in their hearts by the degrading coercion of the whip.

Raised in a black family on the Caribbean island of Martinique, Auguste François Perrinon (1812 - 1861) completed a prestigious military training in France, became a deputy and published a book in 1847 in which he explains that "the work that is being done by slaves could very well be done by free people and at an equal cost".

Consequently, he was invited to join the Commission for the Abolition of Slavery, organized by his friend Victor Schoelcher. Perrinon wrote this vibrant and historic text to celebrate his great victory, the official abolition of slavery in the French colonies of the Caribbean in 1848. An exceptional document.