Labor is the fabled magician's wand, the philosophers stone, and the cap of good fortune.

The battle was first waged over the right of the Negro to be classed as a human being with a soul; later, as to whether he had sufficient intellect to master even the rudiments of learning; and today it is being fought out over his social recognition.

My mother was kept very busy with her sewing; sometimes she would have another woman helping her.

My love for my children makes me glad that I am what I am, and keeps me from desiring to be otherwise; and yet, when I sometimes open a little box in which I still keep my fast yellowing manuscripts, the only tangible remnants of a vanished dream, a dead ambition, a sacrificed talent, I cannot repress the thought, that after all I have chosen the lesser part, that I have sold my birthright for a mess of pottage

In the life of everyone there is a limited number of experiences which are not written upon the memory, but stamped there with a die; and in the long years after, they can be called up in detail, and every emotion that was stirred by them can be lived through anew; these are the tragedies of life.

...one of the best things about running is that no matter how fast you've run in the past, running fast in the future does not come easily or with any guarantees.

There are a great many colored people who are ashamed of the cake-walk, but I think they ought to be proud of it.