“If you truly want to measure the success of a man, you do not measure it by a position he has achieved, but by the obstacles he has overcome.”

At the bottom of education, at the bottom of politics, even at the bottom of religion, there must be for our race economic independence.

You can’t hold a man down without staying down with him.

Men may make laws to hinder and fetter the ballot, but men cannot make laws that will bind or retard the growth of manhood.

Nothing ever comes to one, that is worth having, except as a result of hard work.

I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.

Educated men and women, especially those who are in college, very often get the idea that religion is fit only for the common people. No young man or woman can make a greater error than this.

It means a great deal, I think, to start off on a foundation which one has made for oneself.

The circumstances that surround a man’s life are not important. How that man responds to those circumstances IS IMPORTANT. His response is the ultimate determining factor between success and failure.

I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has had to overcome while trying to succeed.

We don’t just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.

There is no escape – man drags man down, or man lifts man up.

Never let your work drive you. Master it and keep it in complete control.

An inch of progress is worth more than a yard of complaint.

You may fill your heads with knowledge or skillfully train your hands, but unless it is based upon high, upright character, upon a true heart, it will amount to nothing. You will be no better than the most ignorant.

Success always leaves footprints.

Holding a grudge does not hurt the person against whom the grudge is held, it hurts the one who holds it.

You were put on this earth to achieve your greatest self, to live out your purpose, and to do it courageously.

Leadership means bringing people together in pursuit of a common cause, developing a plan to achieve it, and staying with it until the goal is achieved.

All great achievements are the result of sustained focus over time-all of them.

Those who have the ability to be grateful are the ones who have the ability to achieve greatness.

There is no short cut to acheivement.

The only performance that makes it, that really makes it, that makes it all the way, is the one that achieves madness.

If you have the desire and passion to do something, and it’s within God’s will, you will achieve it.

If you want to achieve widespread impact and lasting value, be bold.