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.

The longer I live and the more I study the question, the more I am convinced that it is not so much the problem of what you will do with Negro, as what the Negro will do with you and your 'civilization'.

Most leaders spend time trying to get others to think highly of them, when instead they should try to get their people to think more highly of themselves. It's wonderful when the people believe in their leader. It's more wonderful when the leader believes in their people! You can't hold a man down without staying down with him.

No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.

We all should rise, above the clouds of ignorance, narrowness, and selfishness.

Too often the educational value of doing well what is done, however little, is overlooked. One thing well done prepares the mind to do the next thing better. Not how much, but how well, should be the motto. One problem thoroughly understood is of more value than a score poorly mastered.

I pity from the bottom of my heart any nation or body of people that is so unfortunate as to get entangled in the net of slavery.