A great man is different from an eminent one in that he is ready to be the servant of the society.
That man is the noblest creature may also be inferred from the fact that no other creature has yet contested this claim.
Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world.
Human history is in essence a history of ideas.
We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory will swell when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.
A woman's chastity consists, like an onion, of a series of coats.
If money help a man to do good to others, it is of some value; but if not, it is simply a mass of evil, and the sooner it is got rid of, the better.
Humanity is acquiring all the right technology for all the wrong reasons.
Treat people as if they were what they ought to be, and you help them to become what they are capable of being.
It’s extraordinary how self-obsessed human beings are. There is so much more out there than what connects to us.
Everyone has his own specific vocation or mission in life; everyone must carry out a concrete assignment that demands fulfillment. Therein he cannot be replaced, nor can his life be repeated, thus, everyone's task is unique as his specific opportunity to implement it.
Men are anxious to improve their circumstances, but are unwilling to improve themselves; they therefore remain bound.
These are people who are capable of devotion, public devotion, to justice. They meant what they said and every day that passes, they mean it more.
There seems to be some perverse human characteristic that likes to make easy things difficult.
As far as I knew white women were never lonely, except in books. White men adored them, Black men desired them and Black women worked for them.
No mortal can keep a secret. If the lips are silent, he chatters with his fingertips; betrayal oozes out of him at every pore.
I measure the progress of a community by the degree of progress which women have achieved.
A question that sometimes drives me hazy: Am I, or the others, crazy?
The first human who hurled an insult instead of a stone was the founder of civilization.
Great men are like eagles, and build their nest on some lofty solitude.
Everywhere man blames nature and fate yet his fate is mostly but the echo of his character and passion, his mistakes and his weaknesses.