F any one thing in my experience, more than another, served to deepen my conviction of the infernal character of slavery, and to fill me with unutterable loathing of slaveholders, it was their base ingratitude to my poor old grandmother. She had served my old master faithfully from youth to old age. She had been the source of all his wealth; she had peopled his plantation with slaves; she had become a great-grandmother in his service. She had rocked him in infancy, attended him in childhood, served him through life, and at his death wiped from his icy brow the cold death-sweat, and closed his eyes forever. Douglass’s purpose in this excerpt is to

praise the kindness and faithfulness of his grandmother.
mourn the death of a master who had been kind to him.
provide an example of the torment enslaved persons endure.
argue that enslaved persons should be set free when their master dies.