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

In all things that are purely social we can be as separate as the fingers, yet one as the hand in all things essential to mutual progress.

Few things help an individual more than to place responsibility upon him, and to let him know that you trust him.

Success is not measured by where you are in life, but the obstacles you’ve over come.

Decide to be your best. In the long run the world is going to want and have the best and that might as well be you.

A race, like an individual, lifts itself up by lifting others up.

We must reinforce argument with results.

Great men cultivate love and only little men cherish a spirit of hatred; assistance given to the weak makes the one who gives it strong; oppression of the unfortunate makes one weak.

No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.

The world cares very little about what a man or woman knows; it is what the man or woman is able to do that counts.

I pity from the bottom of my heart any individual who is so unfortunate as to get into the habit of holding race prejudice, for nothing else makes one so blind and narrow.

I think I have learned, in some degree at least, to disregard the old maxim “”Do not get others to do what you can do yourself.”” My motto on the other hand is; “”Do not do that which others can do as well.

There is no defense or security for any of us except in the highest intelligence and development of all.

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.

You know, it’s no accident that the great painters came from areas like Europe where there is a lot of clouds and rain, which begets color and subtle washes of tone.

Today, at Harvard, any student with the currently fashionable color of skin is given rights denied to students of the currently unfashionable color.

Before pride waves a white flag, it waves all other colors.

I saw a sunset in Queretaro that seemed to reflect the color of a rose in Bengal.

But settled things were enemies to me and soon lost their newness and color. The unknown called.

I hated myself totally white. So now I cheat. It’s my white hair, and I put color there.

So that we don’t go mad in the leisure, we have color TV. So that there will never, never, be a moment of silence, we have radio and Muzak.

What have we got here in America that we believe we cannot live without?