All quotes

It is at the bottom of life we must begin, and not at the top. Nor should we permit our grievances to overshadow our opportunities.

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.

The Negro boy has obstacles, discouragements, and temptations to battle with that are little known to those not situated as he is.

Little by little, very slowly, and with most unjust and cruel opposition, at cost of all life holds most dear, it is being gradually established by many martyrdoms that human work is woman’s as well as man’s.

he kept his mind at full stretch like a bow, and never gave in to old age by growing slack

The history of human growth and development is at the same time the history of the terrible struggle of every new idea heralding the approach of a brighter dawn.

Bring now, O Zeus, any difficulty that thou pleasest, for I have means given to me by thee and powers for honoring myself through the things which happen.

A man must shape himself to a new mark directly the old one goes to ground.

That was all of tangible things; but in memories we were rich. We had pierced the veneer of outside things.

The movement of the floes was beyond all human control, and there was nothing to be gained by allowing one's mind to struggle with the problems of the future, though it was hard to avoid anxiety at times.

Most people consider life a battle, but it is not a battle, it is a game.

The simple rules are fearless faith, nonresistance and love!

A man's troubles are always half disposed of, when he finds endurance his only remedy.

At times I would rise up, a flash of energetic freedom would dart through my soul, accompanied with a faint beam of hope, that flickered for a moment, and then vanished.

My long-crushed spirit rose, cowardice departed, bold defiance took its place; and I now resolved that, however long I might remain a slave in form, the day had passed forever when I could be a slave in fact.

You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man

We have more will than wallet; but will is what we need.

The war of my life had begun; and though one of God's most powerless creatures, I resolved never to be conquered.

Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence, and I learn, whatever state I may be in, therein to be content.

Joy deserted my heart, and for a long, long time I lived in doubt, anxiety and fear.

We may hasten or we may retard, but we can not prevent, the final reconciliation.

Cease your complaining and fretting; none of these things which you blame are the cause of your poverty; the cause is within yourself, and where the cause is, there is the remedy.

To admit that this picture has its shades is but to say that it is still the condition of men upon earth.

A night's sleep, the sovereign remedy for the smaller vexations of life, had no effect on it.

At first I hoped that the cloud would pass away of itself; but it did not.