26
From the time that I can remember anything, almost every day of my life had been occupied in some kind of labour; though I think I would now be a more useful man if I had had time for sports.
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35 quotes by Booker T. Washington · clear filters
27
I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.
28
My experience has been that the time to test a true gentleman is to observe him when he is in contact with individuals of a race that is less fortunate than his own.
29
My experience is that there is something in human nature which always makes an individual recognize and reward merit, no matter under what colour of skin merit is found.
30
Nothing ever comes to me, that is worth having, except as the result of hard work.
31
The Negro boy has obstacles, discouragements, and temptations to battle with that are little known to those not situated as he is.
32
There is no education which one can get from books and costly apparatus that is equal to that which can be gotten from contact with great men and women
33
There is a vast difference between working and being worked.
34
There is an indescribable something about work with the hands that tends to develop a student's mind.
35
I learned that assistance given to the weak makes the one who gives it strong; and that oppression of the unfortunate makes one weak.
Attribution contested
Circulated everywhere as if you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else, which appears in none of Washington's books, addresses or letters. This is the sentence in Up from Slavery it compresses. The paraphrase is not unfair, but it is not a quotation, and it drops the second half -- the claim that oppressing the unfortunate makes the oppressor weak -- which is the part he was actually arguing.