Booker T. Washington Quotes

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 had to overcome while trying to succeed.

There are two ways of exerting one's strength: one is pushing down, the other is pulling up.

Those who are happiest are those who do the most for others.

Success waits patiently for anyone who has the determination and strength to seize it.

I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.

If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.

The happiest people are those who do the most for others. The most miserable are those who do the least.

Success is not measured by where you are in life, but the obstacles you've over come

Political activity alone cannot make a man free. Back of the ballot, he must have property, industry, skill, economy, intelligence, and character.

We all should rise, above the clouds of ignorance, narrowness, and selfishness.

I have begun everything with the idea that I could succeed, and I never had much patience with the multitudes of people who are always ready to explain why one cannot succeed.

Decide to be your best. In the long run the world is going to want and have the best and that might as well be you.

The highest test of the civilization of any race is in its willingness to extend a helping hand to the less fortunate.

Start where you are with what you have, knowing that what you have is plenty enough.

Few things help an individual more than to place responsibility upon him, and to let him know that you trust him.

Nothing ever comes to one, that is worth having, except as a result of hard work.

The older I grow, the more I am convinced that there is no education which one can get from books and costly apparatus that is equal to that which can be gotten from contact with great men and women.

We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.

Excellence is to do a common thing in an uncommon way.

Character, not circumstances, makes the man.

Great men cultivate love...only little men cherish a spirit of hatred

At the bottom of education, at the bottom of politics, even at the bottom of religion, there must be for our race economic independence.

Educated men and women, especially those who are in college, very often get the idea that religion is fit only for the common people. No young man or woman can make a greater error than this.

Holding a grudge does not hurt the person against whom the grudge is held, it hurts the one who holds it.

An inch of progress is worth more than a yard of complaint.

Never let your work drive you. Master it and keep it in complete control.

Those who have accomplished the greatest results are those...who never grow excited or lose self-control, but are always calm, self-possessed, patient and polite.

There is no defense or security for any of us except in the highest intelligence and development of all.

No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.

There is no power on earth that can neutralize the influence of a high, simple and useful life.

It often requires more courage to suffer in silence than to rebel, more courage not to strike back than to retaliate, more courage to be silent than to speak.

Ignorance is more costly to any State than education.

You can't hold a man down without staying down with him.

Remember that everyone's life is measured by the power that individual has to make the world better-this is all life is.

The world cares very little about what a man or woman knows; it is what the man or woman is able to do that counts.

Success always leaves footprints.

The thing to do when one feels sure that he has said or done the right thing and is condemned, is to stand still and keep quiet. If he is right, time will show it.

No one can degrade us except ourselves.

Lay hold of something that will help you, and then use it to help somebody else.

You measure the size of the accomplishment by the obstacles you have to overcome to reach your goals.

I think I have learned that the best way to lift one's self up is to help someone else.

I shall never permit myself to stoop so low as to hate any man.

Character is power.

You go to school, you study about the Germans and the French, but not about your own race. I hope the time will come when you study black history too.

We must not only become reliable, progressive, skillful and intelligent, but we must keep the idea constantly before our youths that all forms of labor, whether with the hand or head, are honorable.

The individual who can do something that the world wants done will, in the end, make his way regardless of his race.

Whenever your life touches mine, you make me stronger of weaker... there is no escape... people drag others or lift others up.

Living is the art of loving. Loving is the art of caring. Caring is the art of sharing. Sharing is the art of living. If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.

In all things that are purely social we can be as separate as the fingers, yet one as the hand in all things essential to mutual progress.

Dignify and glorify common labor. It is at the bottom of life that we must begin, not at the top.