“I didn’t know I was a slave until I found out I couldn’t do the things I wanted.”

A man is worked upon by what he works on. He may carve out his circumstances, but his circumstances will carve him out as well.

I had as well be killed running as die standing.

The marriage institution cannot exist among slaves, and one sixth of the population of democratic America is denied it’s privileges by the law of the land.

Every one of us should be ashamed to be free while his brother is a slave.

At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed.

Our community belongs to us and whether it is mean or majestic, whether arrayed in glory or covered in shame, we cannot but share its character and destiny.

We may explain success mainly by one word and that word is work.

A battle lost or won is easily described, understood, and appreciated, but the moral growth of a great nation requires reflection, as well as observation, to appreciate it.

Where justice is denied, where poverty is enforced, where ignorance prevails, and where any one class is made to feel that society is an organized conspiracy to oppress, rob and degrade them, neither persons nor property will be safe.

Nature has given woman the same powers, and subjected her to the same earth, breathes the same air, subsists on the same food, physical, moral, mental and spiritual. She has, therefore, an equal right with man, in all efforts to obtain and maintain a perfect existence.

The white man’s happiness cannot be purchased by the black man’s misery.

The thing worse than rebellion is the thing that causes rebellion.

A man’s character always takes its hue, more or less, from the form and color of things about him.

A man’s rights rest in three boxes: the ballot box, the jury box, and the cartridge box.

A little learning, indeed, may be a dangerous thing, but the want of learning is a calamity to any people.

Truth is proper and beautiful in all times and in all places.

I have never found anybody who could stand to accept the daily demonstrative love I feel in me, and give back as good as I give.

If they were meant to be together they would find a way to do it.

I have found that the greatest degree of inner tranquility comes from the development of love and compassion.

When I found somebody who I fell in love with, it made me feel different than I felt the rest of the day.

When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.

I’m not happy all the time, and I wouldn’t want to be because that would make me a shallow person. But I do try to find the good in everybody.

Happiness is not something you find, but rather something you create.

If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking.