Children have never been very good at listening to their elders, but they have never failed to imitate them.

No one knows very much about the life of another. This ignorance becomes vivid, if you love another. Love sets the imagination on fire, and, also, eventually, chars the imagination into a harder element: imagination cannot match love, cannot plunge so deep, or range so wide.

When the white man came to Africa, the white man had the Bible and the African had the land, but now it is the white man who is being, reluctantly and bloodily, separated from the land, and the African who is still attempting to digest or to vomit up the Bible.

We have all had the experience of finding that our reactions and perhaps even our deeds have denied beliefs we thought were ours.

In the invincible and indescribable squalor of Harlem ... I was tormented. I felt caged, like an animal. I wanted to escape. I felt if I did not get out I would slowly strangle.

The hope of the world lies in what one demands, not of others, but of oneself.

Trust life, and it will teach you, in joy and sorrow, all you need to know.