The problem [ of the twenty-two million Afro-Americans] is so broad that it's going to take the inner working of all organizations.

10 years ago the black man knew what his condition was. And today, because of the world revolution that's taking place all over this earth, the black man would be fighting for what he knows is his by right, but the movement on the part of [Martin Luther] King and the others had done nothing but slow down the militancy that is inherent in the nature of the black man.

Any time you see someone more successful than you are, they are doing something you aren't.

It is the system itself that, that is incapable of producing freedom for the twenty-two million Afro-Americans. Just like a chicken can't lay a duck egg, a chicken can't lay a duck egg, because the system of the chicken isn't constructed in the way to produce a duck egg. And just as that chicken system can't produce, is not capable to, of producing a duck egg, the political and economic system of this country is absolutely incapable of producing freedom and justice and equality and human dignity for the twenty-two million Afro-Americans.

I might add how in the world can you say, or can anyone say, that it will dignify the American Negro to beg in or wade [?] in or plead in when the people in Hungary didn't beg in? They were freedom fighters. And they fought for their freedom.

Any number of my former brothers felt they would make heroes of themselves in the Nation of Islam if they killed me. ...I knew that no one would kill you quicker than Muslim if he felt that's what Allah wanted him to do.

It takes heart to be a guerrilla warrior because you’re on your own. In conventional warfare you have tanks and a whole lot of other people with you to back you up - planes over your head and all that kind of stuff. But a guerrilla is on his own. All you have is a rifle, some sneakers and a bowl of rice, and that’s all you need - and a lot of heart.