36 quotes
I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.
Up From Slavery (1901)
Progress, progress is the law of nature; under God it shall be our eternal guiding star.
Men may make laws to hinder and fetter the ballot, but men cannot make laws that will bind or retard the growth of manhood.
My whole life has largely been one of surprises.
Up From Slavery (1901)
Character, not circumstances, makes the man.
No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem. It is at the bottom of life we must begin, and not at the top.
Up From Slavery (1901)
The home life of the English seems to me to be about as perfect as anything can be. Everything moves like clockwork.
Up From Slavery (1901)
Providence so often uses men and institutions to accomplish a purpose.
Up From Slavery (1901)
I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has overcome while trying to succeed.
Up From Slavery (1901)
Wherever, in any country the whole people feel that the happiness of all is dependent upon the happiness of the weakest, there freedom exists.
There is no power on earth, that can neutralize the influence of a high, pure, simple and useful life.
Nothing ever comes to me, that is worth having, except as the result of hard work.
Up From Slavery (1901)
Suppose to-day Negroes do steal; who was it that for centuries made stealing a virtue by stealing their labor?
Few things can help an individual more than to place responsibility on him, and to let him know that you trust him.
Up From Slavery (1901)
No man who continues to add something to the material, intellectual, and moral well-being of the place in which he lives is long left without proper reward.
Up From Slavery (1901)
I learned the lesson that great men cultivate love, and that only little men cherish a spirit of hatred. I learned that assistance given to the weak makes the one who gives it strong; and that oppression of the unfortunate makes one weak.
Up From Slavery (1901)
The world cares very little what you or I know, but it does care a great deal about what you or I do.
There is no escape — man drags man down, or man lifts man up.
The Great Quotations (1971)
You can't hold a man down without staying down with him.
The Great Quotations (1971)
I pity from the bottom of my heart any nation or body of people that is so unfortunate as to get entangled in the net of slavery.
Up From Slavery (1901)