In the ring I can stay until I’m old and gray because I know how to hit and dance away

There are more pleasant things to do than beat up people.

It's the lack of faith that makes people afraid of meeting challenges, and I believe in myself. He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life. I figured that if I said it enough, I would convince the world that I really was the greatest.

I barely got out of school, I got out of school, mainly, because I was a champ, and I actually didn't pass. I won't name the teachers that put me through, but I want. If I was not a Muslim, or a follower of the Honorable Elijah Mohammed I couldn't talk to somebody for two minutes. I believe I can hold my own as an intelligent conversation, but it all come from the Honorable Elijah Mohammed.

Every time I look in the mirror, I see that kid from Louisville, Kentucky, staring back at me. His name was Cassius Clay.

Black people in America will never be free so long as they're on the white man's land. We can't be free until we get our own land and our own country in North America. When we separate from America and take maybe ten states, then we'll be free.

The fight is won or lost far away from witnesses - behind the lines, in the gym, and out there on the road, long before I dance under those lights.