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Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.

James Baldwin

If you cannot love me, I will die. Before you came I wanted to die, I have told you many times. It is cruel to have made me want to live only to make my death more bloody
JAMES BALDWIN

Cruel Death Die Live Love
Everyone wishes to be loved, but in the event, nearly no one can bear it. Everyone desires love but also finds it impossible to believe that he deserves it.
JAMES BALDWIN

Believe Deserve Desire Dreamss Event Love Wish
Guilt is a luxury that we can no longer afford.
JAMES BALDWIN

Afford Grief Guilt Hurt Luxury One Liner
American history is longer, larger, more various, more beautiful, and more terrible than anything anyone has ever said about it.
JAMES BALDWIN

Beautiful History Terrible
Those who say it can’t be done are usually interrupted by others doing it.
JAMES BALDWIN

Inspirational Interrupt Sky
Love was a country he knew nothing about.
JAMES BALDWIN

Country Humour Love One Liner
People who treat other people as less than human must not be surprised when the bread they have cast on the waters comes floating back to them, poisoned.
JAMES BALDWIN

Bread Float Human People Poison Surprise Water
Most of us are about as eager to be changed as we were to be born, and go through our changes in a similar state of shock.
JAMES BALDWIN

Born Change Inspirational Shock State
You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read.
JAMES BALDWIN

Broken Heart Heart History Pain Read Thinking World
Hatred, which could destroy so much, never failed to destroy the man who hated, and this was an immutable law.
JAMES BALDWIN

Destroy Failure Hate Hatred Law Man
It is astonishing the lengths to which a person, or a people, will go in order to avoid a truthful mirror.
JAMES BALDWIN

Mirror People Person Truth
People who believe that they are strong-willed and the masters of their destiny can only continue to believe this by becoming specialists in self-deception.
JAMES BALDWIN

Believe Cheat Destiny Master People Strong
All I know about music is that not many people ever really hear it.
JAMES BALDWIN

Hear Listen Music One Liner People
Trust life, and it will teach you, in joy and sorrow, all you need to know.
JAMES BALDWIN

Happiness Inspirational Joy Life Sad Sorrow Teaching Trust
If you’re treated a certain way you become a certain kind of person.
JAMES BALDWIN

Deep Insult One Liner Person Respect Treat
There are so many ways of being despicable it quite makes one’s head spin. But the way to be really despicable is to be contemptuous of other people’s pain.
JAMES BALDWIN

Pain People Suffering
Freedom is not something that anybody can be given. Freedom is something people take, and people are as free as they want to be.
JAMES BALDWIN

Freedom Independence Liberty Patriotism People
To be sensual, I think, is to respect and rejoice in the force of life, of life itself, and to be present in all that one does, from the effort of loving to the breaking of bread.
JAMES BALDWIN

Bread Effort Force Life Love Present Rejoice Respect Sensual
To be a Negro in this country and to be relatively conscious is to be in a rage almost all the time.
JAMES BALDWIN

Consicious Country Negro Reative Time
For these are all our children, we will all profit by or pay for what they become.
JAMES BALDWIN

Children Inspirational Pay Profit
Please try to remember that what they believe, as well as what they do and cause you to endure does not testify to your inferiority but to their inhumanity.
JAMES BALDWIN

Believe Endure Humanity Inferior Remember
Anyone who has ever struggled with poverty knows how extremely expensive it is to be poor.
JAMES BALDWIN

Expensive Life Poverty Struggle
You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read.
JAMES BALDWIN

Book Pain Read
The moment we cease to hold each other, the sea engulfs us and the light goes out.
JAMES BALDWIN

Cease Each Other Hold Light Moments Sea
The role of the artist is exactly the same as the role of the lover. If I love you, I have to make you conscious of the things you don’t see.
JAMES BALDWIN

Consicious I Love You Love Lover Role
Any real change implies the breakup of the world as one has always known it, the loss of all that gave one an identity, the end of safety.
JAMES BALDWIN

Breakup World Change Identity Real Safety
When you’re writing you’re trying to find out something which you don’t know.
JAMES BALDWIN

Curosity Passion Peace Try Writing

Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.

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Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.

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Popular Authors

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