No race can prosper ’til it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling the field, as in writing a poem.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Pride, Dignity
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. Out of the hard and unusual struggle through which he is compelled to pass, he gets a strength, a confidence, that one misses whose pathway is comparatively smooth by reason of birth and race.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Success, Failure, Racism, Obstacles
There is no power on earth that can neutralize the influence of a high, simple and useful life.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Life, Helpfulness, Leadership
Any man’s life will be filled with constant, unexpected encouragements of this kind if he makes up his mind to do his level best each day of his life — that is, tries to make each day reach as nearly as possible the high-water mark of pure, unselfish, useful living.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Doing Your Best, Encouragement, Support
Few things help an individual more than to place responsibility upon him, and to let him know that you trust him.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Trust, Responsibility
One man cannot hold another man down in the ditch without remaining down in the ditch with him.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Kindness
I have learned, in some degree at least, to disregard the old maxim which says, “Do not get others to do that which you can do yourself”. My motto, on the other hand, is, “Do not do that which others can do as well”.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Confidence
You can’t hold a man down without staying down with him.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Adversity
An ounce of application is worth a ton of abstraction.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Perseverance
Success in life is founded upon attention to the small things rather than to the large things; to the everyday things nearest to us rather than to the things that are remote and uncommon.
—Booker T. Washington
There are two ways of exerting one’s strength; one is pushing down, the other is pulling up.
—Booker T. Washington
Topics: Strength
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- Horace Mann American Educator
- Frank Moore Colby American Educator
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- Theodore Hesburgh American Catholic Educator