Everybody has the blues. Everybody longs for meaning. Everybody needs to love and be loved. Everybody needs to clap hands and be happy. Everybody longs for faith. In music, especially this broad category called jazz, there is a stepping-stone to all of these.

Freedom only comes through persistent revolt, through persistent agitation, through persistently rising up against the system of evil.

It is not a sign of weakness, but a sign of high maturity, to rise to the level of self-criticism.

Sooner or later, all the peoples of the world will have to discover a way to live together in peace, and thereby transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood.

The self cannot be self without other selves.

Nonviolence is an imperative in order to bring about ultimate community.

Courageous men never lose the zest for living even though their life situation is zestless; cowardly men, overwhelmed by the uncertainties of life, lose the will to live. We must constantly build dykes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.