black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

Whiteness is ownership of the earth.

W. E. B. Du Bois

It is the growing custom to narrow control, concentrate power, disregard and disenfranchise the public; and assuming that certain powers by divine right of money-raising or by sheer assumption, have the power to do as they think best without consulting the wisdom of mankind.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Divine Growth Kind Man Money Power Right Thinking Wisdom
When in this world a man comes forward with a thought, a deed, a vision, we ask not how does he look, but what is his message? The world still wants to ask that a woman primarily be pretty.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Appearance Beautiful Men Thinking Vision Woman World
We cannot escape the clear fact that what is going to win in this world is reason, if this ever becomes a reasonable world.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Escape Reason Run Win World
There is but one coward on earth, and that is the coward that dare not know.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Dare Earth Oneself
Race prejudice decreases values, both real estate and human.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Human Prejudice Race Reality Value Worth
One thing alone I charge you. As you live, believe in life! Always human beings will live and progress to greater, broader and fuller life. The only possible death is to lose belief in this truth simply because the great end comes slowly, because time is long.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Believe Death Greatness Human Life Live Possible Progress Simplicity Time
No universal selfishness can bring social good to all.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Goodness Selfish
The time must come when, great and pressing as change and betterment may be, they do not involve killing and hurting people.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Better Change Death Hurt Kill People Time
The emancipation of man is the emancipation of labor and the emancipation of labor is the freeing of that basic majority of workers who are yellow, brown and black.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Black Freedom Man Work
Progress in human affairs is more often a pull than a push, a surging forward of the exceptional man, and the lifting of his duller brethren slowly and painfully to his vantage-ground.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Human Justice Men Pain Progress
Lord, make us mindful of the little things that grow and blossom in these days to make the world beautiful for us.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Beautiful Growth Mindset Religion World
The worker must work for the glory of his handiwork, not simply for pay; the thinker must think for truth, not for fame.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Glory Pay Simplicity Thinking Truth Work
The favorite device of the devil, ancient and modern, is to force a human being into a more or less artificial class, accuse the class of unnamed and unnameable sin, and then damn any individual in the alleged class, however innocent he may be.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Class Device Devil Diversity Innocent Justice Sin
Most men today cannot conceive of a freedom that does not involve somebody’s slavery.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Deep Freedom Men Slave
Whiteness is ownership of the earth.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Earth White
One ever feels his twoness – an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Alone Body Darkness Feeling Soul Strength
There is no force equal to a woman determined to rise.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Determination Equality Force Rise Woman
The emancipation of man is the emancipation of labor and the emancipation of labor is the freeing of that basic majority of workers who are yellow, brown and black.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Black Freedom Man Work
So often do you see collegians enter life with high resolve and lofty purpose and then watch them shrink and shrink to sordid, selfish, shrewd plodders, full of distrust and sneers.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Learning Life Purpose Selfish Trust
The theory of democratic government is not that the will of the people is always right, but rather that normal human beings of average intelligence will, if given a chance, learn the right and best course by bitter experience.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Democracy Experience Government Intelligence Learning People Right Theory Willing
Ignorance is a cure for nothing.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Ignorance One Liner
Believe in life! Always human beings will live and progress to greater, broader, and fuller life.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Believe Greatness Hope Human Life Progress
To be a poor man is hard, but to be a poor race in a land of dollars is the very bottom of hardships.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Hard Land Men Poor Race
Education must not simply teach work-it must teach life.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Education Life Simplicity Teaching Thinking Work
It is the wind and the rain, O God, the cold and the storm that make this earth of yours to blossom and bear its fruit. So in our lives it is storm and stress and hurt and suffering that make real men and women bring the world’s work to its highest perfection.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Hurt Live Man Perfection Rain Reality Storm Stress Suffering Woman Work World
The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line, — the relation of the darker to the lighter races of men in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Appearance Darkness Light People Problem Race Sea
The world is shrinking together; it is finding itself neighbor to itself in strange, almost magic degree.
W. E. B. DU BOIS

Magic Strange Togetherness World

Whiteness is ownership of the earth.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

Whiteness is ownership of the earth.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More W. E. B. Du Bois Quotes