“When the past no longer illuminates the future, the spirit walks in darkness.”

America is great because she is good.

We can state with conviction, therefore, that a man’s support for absolute government is in direct proportion to the contempt he feels for his country.

If an American was condemned to confine his activity to his own affairs, he would be robbed of one half of his existence.

Generally speaking, only simple conceptions can grip the mind of a nation. An idea that is clear and precise even though false will always have greater power in the world than an idea that is true but complex.

When I refuse to obey an unjust law, I do not contest the right of the majority to command, but I simply appeal from the sovereignty of the people to the sovereignty of mankind.

Life is to be entered upon with courage.

One of the most ordinary weaknesses of the human intellect is to seek to reconcile contrary principles, and to purchase peace at the expense of logic.

All those who seek to destroy the liberties of a democratic nation ought to know that war is the surest and shortest means to accomplish it.

I know of no country in which there is so little independence of mind and real freedom of discussion as in America.

I have only one passion, the love of liberty and human dignity.

The tie of language is perhaps the strongest and the most durable that can unite mankind.

I should have loved freedom, I believe, at all times, but in the time in which we live I am ready to worship it.

Nothing is so dangerous as that of violence employed by well-meaning people for beneficial objects.

Righteous women in their circle of influence, beginning in the home, can turn the world around.

If I were asked to what the singular prosperity and growing strength of Americans ought mainly to be attributed, I should reply: To the superiority of their women.

The last thing a political party gives up is its vocabulary.

Did you know that in New Orleans they still have brown bag parties? What’s that, you ask? You and I go to a party, and when we get to the door, there’s a brown bag hanging down from the ceiling, and if our skin is darker than the brown bag, we can’t go in.

Let me light my lamp , says the star, And never debate if it will help to remove the darkness

Hold your head high, stick your chest out. It gets dark sometimes, but morning comes. Keep hope alive.

The water in a vessel is sparkling; the water in the sea is dark. The small truth has words which are clear; the great truth has great silence.

If I can’t make it through one door, I’ll go through another door- or i’ll make a door. Something terrific will come no matter how dark the present.

Sometimes, we are stuck in the dark for so long, we sometimes forget what light looks like, what hope and love feel like.

The small wisdom is like water in a glass, clear, transparent, pure. The great wisdom is like the water in the sea: dark, mysterious, impenetrable.

Faith is the bird that feels the light and sings when the dawn is still dark.