Booker T. Washington

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

In my contact with people I find that, as a rule, it is only the little, narrow people who live for themselves, who never read good books, who do not travel, who never open up their souls in a way to permit them to come into contact with other souls -- with the great outside world. No man whose vision is bounded by colour can come into contact with what is highest and best in the world. In meeting men, in many places, I have found that the happiest people are those who do the most for others; the most miserable are those who do the least. I have also found that few things, if any, are capable of making one so blind and narrow as race prejudice. I often say to our students, in the course of my talks to them on Sunday evenings in the chapel, that the longer I live and the more experience I have of the world, the more I am convinced that, after all, the one thing that is most worth living for -- and dying for, if need be -- is the opportunity of making some one else more happy and more useful.

Character is power.

In my contact with people, I find that, as a rule, it is only the little, narrow people who live for themselves, who never read good books, who do not travel, who never open up their souls in a way to permit them to come into contact with other souls _ with the great outside world.

I knew that, in a large degree, we were trying an experiment--that of testing whether or not it was possible for Negroes to build up and control the affairs of a large education institution. I knew that if we failed it wold injure the whole race.

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.

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

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.

I shall allow no man to belittle my soul by making me hate him.

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.

Success in life is founded upon attention to the small things rather than to the large things to the every day things nearest to us rather than to the things that are remote and uncommon.

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

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

Associate yourself with people of good quality, for it is better to be alone than in bad company.

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

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

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

If you can't read, it's going to be hard to realize dreams.