Marian Anderson Quotes

Fear is a disease that eats away at logic and makes man inhuman.

Prayer begins where human capacity ends.

Prejudice: Sometimes it's like a hair across your cheek. You can't see it, you can't find it with your fingers, but you keep brushing at it because the feel of it is irritating.

You cannot fool an audience.

I had gone to Europe . . . to reach for a place as a serious artist, but I never doubted that I must return. I was - and am - an American.

Where there is money, there is fighting.

Sometimes you're overwhelmed when a thing comes, and you do not realize the magnitude of the affair at that moment. When you get away from it, you wonder, did it really happen to you.

You can't build a chimney from the top, you know.

The minute a person whose word means a great deal dares to take the open-hearted and courageous way, many others follow.

I suppose I might insist on making issues of things. But that is not my nature, and I always bear in mind that my mission is to leave behind me the kind of impression that will make it easier for those who follow.

If you have a purpose in which you can believe, there's no end to the amount of things you can accomplish.

A singer starts by having his instrument as a gift from God... When you have been given something in a moment of grace, it is sacrilegious to be greedy.

There are many persons ready to do what is right because in their hearts they know it is right. But they hesitate, waiting for theother fellow to make the first move--and he, in turn, waits for you. The minute a person whose word means a great deal dares to take the open- hearted and courageous way, many others follow. Not everyone can be turned aside from meanness and hatred, but the great majority of Americans is heading in that direction. I have a great belief in the future of my people and my country.

When you stop having dreams and ideals - well, you might as well stop altogether.

I have a great belief in the future of my people and my country.

As long as you keep a person down, some part of you has to be down there to hold him down, so it means you cannot soar as you otherwise might.

Every one has a gift for something, even if it is the gift of being a good friend.

There are many persons ready to do what is right because in their hearts they know it is right. But they hesitate, waiting for the other fellow to make the make the first move - and he, in turn, waits for you.

None of us is responsible for the complexion of his skin. This fact of nature offers no clue to the character or quality of the person underneath.

A person has to be busy to be alive.

When I sing, I don't want them to see that my face is black; I don't want them to see that my face is white - I want them to see my soul. And that is colorless.

You lose a lot of time, hating people.