“She said the object and color in the materials around us actually have a physical effect on us, on how we feel.”

I think one’s feelings waste themselves in words; they ought all to be distilled into actions which bring results.

No woman has excited “passions” among women more than I have. Yet I leave no school behind me.

In a sick-room or a bed-room there should never be shutters shut.

Religion was important to me. My family and I were very religious. I acctualy believe the work I did was a calling from God himself.

A human being does not cease to exist at death. It is change, not destruction, which takes place.

Apprehension, uncertainty, waiting, expectation, fear of surprise, do a patient more harm than any exertion.

Nursing is a progressive art such that to stand still is to go backwards.

Never to allow a patient to be waked, intentionally or accidentally, is a sine qua non of all good nursing.

Never give nor take an excuse.

It is the unqualified result of all my experience with the sick that, second only to their need of fresh air, is their need of light; that, after a close room, what hurts them most is a dark room and that it is not only light but direct sunlight they want.

Let whoever is in charge keep this simple question in her head (not, how can I always do this right thing myself, but) how can I provide for this right thing to be always done?

The specific disease doctrine is the grand refuge of weak, uncultured, unstable minds, such as now rule in the medical profession. There are no specific diseases; there are specific disease conditions.

Our first journey is to find that special place for us.

Nursing is an art: and if it is to be made an art, it requires an exclusive devotion as hard a preparation as any painter’s or sculptor’s work.

I have lived and slept in the same bed with English countesses and Prussian farm women… no woman has excited passions among women more than I have.

I never lose an opportunity of urging a practical beginning, however small.

But if I were to take a palette all my colours would be of you.

When it comes to partnership, some humans can make their lives alone – it’s possible. But creatively, it’s more like painting: you can’t just use the same colours in every painting. It’s just not an option.

As a person of color, there’s no getting around the reality of its responsibility.

The aquilegia sprinkled on the rocks A scarlet rain; the yellow violet Sat in the chariot of its leaves, the phlox Held spikes of purple flame in meadows wet, And all the streams with vernal-scented reed Were fringed, and streaky bellow of miskodeed.

Aided and abetted by market forces and the laws of supply and demand, he hones his skill to stand up but make sure he’s never counted.

Music is the last true voice of the human spirit. It can go beyond language, beyond age, and beyond color straight to the mind and heart of all people.

People of color, particularly African Americans, feel the stigma more keenly. In a race-conscious society, some don’t want to be perceived as having yet another deficit.

With segregation, with the isolation of the injured and the robbed, comes the concentration of disadvantage.