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

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Never get to the point where you will be ashamed to ask anybody for information. The ignorant man will always be ignorant if he fears that by asking another for information he will display ignorance. Better once display your ignorance of a certain subject than always know nothing of it.

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

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There is a certain class of race problem-solvers who don't want the patient to get well, because as long as the disease holds out they have not only an easy means of making a living, but also an easy medium through which to make themselves prominent before the public.

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

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There is another class of coloured people who make a business of keeping the troubles, the wrongs, and the hardships of the Negro race before the public. Having learned that they are able to make a living out of their troubles, they have grown into the settled habit of advertising their wrongs — partly because they want sympathy and partly because it pays. Some of these people do not want the Negro to lose his grievances, because they do not want to lose their jobs.

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Most leaders spend time trying to get others to think highly of them, when instead they should try to get their people to think more highly of themselves. It's wonderful when the people believe in their leader. It's more wonderful when the leader believes in their people! You can't hold a man down without staying down with him.

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

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

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

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