Douglass's use of the words "severe trial" and "departure", as well as his sentence structure shows a more formal diction. He is basically saying nothing stopped him from leaving. However, he uses much more formal diction. Imagery is the creation of images in the reader's mind through description. There are no images in the reader's mind from this excerpt. There are also no elements of sentiment in the passage or subjectivity.
Formal diction is a style of speaking or writing in a polite, and proper manner. This type of diction often contains descriptive, precise and elegant words, and longer sentence and it is totally free of idioms, colloquialism, slang, and contractions. "I found no severe trial in my departure" is an example of this type of diction as it uses more formal and elegant words such as "severe trial" and "departure", instead of saying it a more informal way like: "I had no problems when leaving" or "I left with no trouble".
