People don't realize how a man's whole life can be changed by one book.

When the snakes out in that field begin to realize that if one of their members get out of line, it's going to be detrimental to all of them, they'll keep that, perhaps they'll then take the necessary steps to keep their fellow snakes away from my chickens or away from my children if the responsibility is placed upon them.

Education is our passport to the future.

If a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy. And what America is trying to do is pass laws to force whites to pretend that they want Negroes into their schools or into - in their places of employment.

You're going to have a racial explosion, and a racial explosion is more dangerous than an atomic explosion. It's going to explode because black people are dissatisfied; they're dissatisfied not only with the white man, but they're dissatisfied with these Negroes who have been sitting around here posing as leaders and spokesmen for black people and actually making the problem worse instead of making the problem better.

Mankind's history has proved from one era to another that the true criterion of leadership is spiritual. Men are attracted by spirit. By power, men are forced. Love is engendered by spirit. By power anxieties are created.

I was in prison and I was an atheist. I didn't believe in anything.