Catching flies is better training than hitting the speed bag

I love boxing and it did a lot for me. But sometimes it made me think how savage human beings could be to each other. That wasn't the kind of boxer I wanted to be. My strategy was to be as scientific as I could when I fought. I didn't want to be seriously hurt, and I didn't want to do that to anybody else either.

If the white man ain't the devil, he's been aiming at the history of the Americans.

God tries you in certain, certain ways. Some people are rich, and they believe in God. They lose the money, things get hard, they get weak and quit going to church. Quit serving God like they did.

If some black man go out and start something, a riot or something or, I'm not going to jump in it and get killed because he's gone out and started something I don't believe in what he's fighting for or his approach.

Oh! how the hours hasten to change into days, the days into months, the months into years, and those into life's annihilation!

Sometimes Howard [Cosell] makes me wish I was a dog and he was a fireplug.