Sometime you just need to be silent, have a drink and crack a smile or somethin', because the human condition, in general, is just overwhelming in so many ways.

There ought to be a robust, uninhibited conversation in black America with different black ideological perspectives.

The powerful have no monopoly on greed, hatred, fear, or ignorance.

And when I talk about love, I'm talking about something that's great, though, brother. I'm talking about something that will sustain you.

There's simply no philosophizing without a love of wisdom, absolutely.

This book is the best treatment of the best American Marxist philosopher-and the best philosopher to emerge from American slums. Young Sidney Hook is essential reading for anyone interested in democratic theory and practice in America.

The love of wisdom is a way of life; that is to say, it's a set of practices that have to do with mustering the courage to think critically about ourselves, society, and the world; mustering the courage to empathize; the courage, I would say, to love; the courage to have compassion with others, especially the widow and the orphan, the fatherless and the motherless, poor and working peoples, gays and lesbians, and so forth - and the courage to hope.