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If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.

Booker T. Washington

There are two ways of exerting one’s strength: one is pushing down, the other is pulling up.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Oneself Strength Way
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.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Heart Prejudice Race
We must not only become reliable, progressive, skillful and intelligent, but we must keep the idea constantly before our youths that all forms of labor, whether with the hand or head, are honorable.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Hands Ideas Intelligent
You must understand the troubles of that man farthest down before you can help him.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Help Himself Man Trouble Understand
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.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Achievement Himself Man Measurement Position Success True
We all should rise, above the clouds of ignorance, narrowness, and selfishness.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Ignorance Narrow Rise Selfish
There is no defense or security for any of us except in the highest intelligence and development of all.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Defense Development Highest
I shall never permit myself to stoop so low as to hate any man.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Hate Man Myself Permit
I let no man drag me down so low as to make me hate him.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Hate Himself Low Man Myself
A race, like an individual, lifts itself up by lifting others up.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

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

Angel Hate Positive
Leaders have devoted themselves to politics, little knowing, it seems that political independence disappears without economic independence that economic independence is the foundation of political independence.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Devotion Foundation Independence Leadership Politics
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.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Circumstance Determination Factor Failure Important Life Man Success Surround
Holding a grudge does not hurt the person against whom the grudge is held, it hurts the one who holds it.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Country Grudge Hurt People
Success always leaves footprints.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Country Footprint People Success
No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Inspirational Work Writing
No white American ever thinks that any other race is wholly civilized until he wears the white man’s clothes, eats the white man’s food, speaks the white man’s language, and professes the white man’s religion.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Food Men Thinking
Excellence is to do a common thing in an uncommon way.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Common Excellence Way
Success in life is founded upon attention to the small things rather than to the large things; to the every day things nearest to us rather than to the things that are remote and uncommon.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Attention Life Remote Small Success
Mere connection with what is known as a superior race will not permanently carry an individual forward unless the individual has worth.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Carry Connection Race Superior Worth
Dignify and glorify common labor. It is at the bottom of life that we must begin, not at the top.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Beginning Dignity Glorify Labor Life
From some things that I have said one may get the idea that some of the slaves did not want freedom. This is not true. I have never seen one who did not want to be free, or one who would return to slavery.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Freedom Ideas Return Slavery
The thing to do when one feels sure that he has said or done the right thing and is condemned, is to stand still and keep quiet. If he is right, time will show it.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Feeling Oneself Right Time
A life is not worth much of which it cannot be said, when it comes to its close, that it was helpful to humanity.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Help Humanity Life Worth
Living is the art of loving. Loving is the art of caring. Caring is the art of sharing. Sharing is the art of living. If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Art Care Live Love Yourself
Dignify and glorify common labor. It is at the bottom of life that we must begin, not at the top.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Bottom Common Labor
My whole life has largely been one of surprises.
BOOKER T. WASHINGTON

Become Life Surprise Whole

If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.

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If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.

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