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he kept his mind at full stretch like a bow, and never gave in to old age by growing slack

The fact is that old age is respectable just as long as it asserts itself, maintains its proper rights, and is not enslaved to any one.

The exercise of these rights should not cost one single American citizen his reputation or his right to a livelihood nor should he be in danger of losing his reputation or livelihood merely because he happens to know someone who holds unpopular beliefs.

As members of the minority party, we do not have the primary authority to formulate the policy of our government. But we do have the responsibility of rendering constructive criticism, of clarifying issues, of allaying fears by acting as responsible citizens.

He who experiments must, while doing so, divest himself of every preconception.

The thoughtful framers of our Constitution legislated for our country as they found it.

Seeking no favors because of our color, nor patronage because of our needs, we knock at the bar of justice, asking an equal chance.

With courage, born of success achieved in the past, with a keen sense of the responsibility which we shall continue to assume, we look forward to a future large with promise and hope.

Shirking responsibility has never been a fault with which colored women might be truthfully charged.

I grew tired and did more harm than good; so, if I met with a difficult point, for example, in algebra, instead of poring over it till I was bewildered, I left it, took my work or some amusing book, and resumed it when my mind was fresh.

I had, and still have, determined perseverance, but I soon found that it was in vain to occupy my mind beyond a certain time.

An honest man’s pillow is his peace of mind, and when you lay down on the pillow at night, no matter who’s in our bed we all sleep alone.

I’d subscribe to the belief that we’re all destined to have to do the thing we fear the most anyway.

Instead of denying these fears, declare them, say them out loud, admit them, give them the credit they deserve.

You are going to make mistakes — own them, make amends, and move on. Guilt and regret kills many a man before their time. Turn the page, get off the ride.

I have never had any trouble turning the page in the book of my life.

Life is not a popularity contest. Be brave, take the hill but first, answer the question, “What is my hill?”

Life’s not easy…don’t try and make it that way. It’s not fair, it never was, it isn’t now, it won’t ever be.

The great law of morality ought to have a national as well as a personal and individual application.

The law is the only sure protection of the weak and the only efficient restraint upon the strong.

Such persons should recollect that without law there can be no real practical liberty; that when law is trampled under foot tyranny rules, whether it appears in the form of a military despotism or of popular violence.

Nations, like individuals in a state of nature, are equal and independent, possessing certain rights and owing certain duties to each other, arising from their necessary and unavoidable relations; which rights and duties there is no common human authority to protect and enforce.

The beauty of our system of government consists, and its safety and durability must consist, in avoiding mutual collisions and encroachments and in the regular separate action of all, while each is revolving in its own distinct orbit.

The man who labors without a definite purpose that is backed up by a definite plan for its attainment, resembles the ship that has lost its rudder.

it must be from one man that it receives its institutions at first, and upon one man that all similar reconstruction must depend