Booker T. Washington
American educator and author, 1856-1915
42 quotes.
Quotes by Booker T. Washington
- A gentleman means simply this: a generous person; one who has learned to be kind; one who has learned to think not of himself first, but of the happiness and welfare of others.
- Feel that you can always learn something from somebody else.
- Few things can help an individual more than to place responsibility on him, and to let him know that you trust him.
- Get hold of the spirit of wanting to help somebody else.
- Grow into the habit of talking about the bright side of life.
- 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.
- 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 have observed that 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.
- I learned the lesson that great men cultivate love, and that only little men cherish a spirit of hatred. I learned that assistance given to the weak makes the one who gives it strong; and that oppression of the unfortunate makes one weak.
- I pity the man, black or white, who has never experienced the joy and satisfaction that come to one by reason of an effort to assist in making some one else more useful and more happy.
- I think I have learned that the best way to lift one's self up is to help someone else.
- I will permit no man to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.
- If you want to be happy, if you want to live a contented life, if you want to live a life of genuine pleasure, do something for somebody else.
- If you want to lift yourself up, lift up someone else.
- In order to be successful in any kind of undertaking, I think the main thing is for one to grow to the point where he completely forgets himself; that is, to lose himself in a great cause.
- In proportion as one loses himself in the way, in the same degree does he get the highest happiness out of his work.
- Know all there is to be known about the position you occupy, but ever feel that there is more for you to learn.
- No race can prosper till it learns that there is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem.
- Nothing ever comes to me, that is worth having, except as the result of hard work.
- Now we expect every student who goes out from Tuskegee to be, not the man who tries to see how little he can do, or the average man who proposes to do merely his duty, but the man above the average, who will do more than his duty.
- One man cannot hold another man down in the ditch without remaining down in the ditch with him.
- Opportunity is like a bald-headed man with only a patch of hair right in front. You have to grab that hair, grasp the opportunity while it's confronting you, else you'll be grasping a slick bald head.
- 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.
- The happy people and the successful people are those who go out of their way to reach and influence for good as many persons as they can.
- The man or the woman who is not a servant is one who accomplishes nothing.
- The more you do to make somebody else happy, the more happiness will you receive in turn.
- The student who lays the bricks must learn to lay each brick as well as it is possible for him to lay it, and then do still better work on the morrow.
- The world cares very little what you or I know, but it does care a great deal about what you or I do.
- There are two ways of exerting one's strength: one is pushing down, the other is pulling up.
- There is no escape — man drags man down, or man lifts man up.
- Those who are happiest are those who do the most for others.
- To do the most that lies in you, you must go with a heart and head full of hope and faith in the world, believing that there is work for you to do, believing that you are the person to accomplish that work, and the one who is going to accomplish it.
- To get the greatest good out of life is to do something for somebody else.
- To get the greatest happiness out of life is to make somebody else happy.
- You cannot afford to learn to speak anything but the absolute truth.
- You can't hold a man down without staying down with him.
- You may go out and make great speeches, you may write books or addresses which are great literature, but unless you have character behind what you say and write, it will amount to nothing; it will all go to the winds.
- You measure the size of the accomplishment by the obstacles you had to overcome to reach your goals.
- You should remain in school until you get to the point where you feel that you do not know anything, where you feel that you are willing to learn from any one who can teach you.
- Character is Power.