The actual sight of a first-class house that a Negro has built is ten times more potent than pages of discussion about a house that he ought to build, or perhaps could build.
Booker T. WashingtonRead
I would permit no man, no matter what his colour might be, to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote emphasizes the importance of maintaining one's integrity and humanity, regardless of how others may treat us.
In this quote, Booker T. Washington is conveying that he will not allow anyone's actions or prejudices to determine his own feelings or degrade his character. He highlights the idea that hatred is a choice and that one can choose to rise above the hate directed at them, thus preserving their own dignity and soul against the negativity of others.
Themes
HateSoulIntegrityCharacterPrejudice
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech about tolerance and acceptance.
More from Booker T. Washington
All quotes βLeaders have devoted themselves to politics, little knowing, it seems _x000D_ that political independence disappears without economic independence _x000D_ that economic independence is the foundation of political independence.
Booker T. WashingtonRead
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.
Booker T. WashingtonRead
Nothing ever comes to one, that is worth having, except as a result of hard work.
Booker T. WashingtonRead
I shall allow no man to belittle my soul by making me hate him.
Booker T. WashingtonRead
If I have done anything in life worth attention, I feel sure that I inherited the disposition from my mother.
Booker T. WashingtonRead
Similar quotes
The three great elements of modern civilization, Gun powder, Printing, and the Protestant religion.
Thomas CarlyleRead
I know that every time I list something that I am, I am potentially alienating a whole group of people. Publicists and managers will encourage you not to say what political party you belong to, what you eat, what you don't eat, who you sleep with and all that stuff.
Ellen DegeneresRead
You should always take a religion at its best and not at its worst, from its highest teachings and not from the lowest practices of some of its adherents.
Annie BesantRead
Man is able to decide for or against reason, he is able to create beyond reason or to destroy below reason
Paul TillichRead
The soul is the prison of the body.
Michel FoucaultRead
She tried to fancy what the flame of a candle is like after the candle is blown out, for she could not remember ever having seen such a thing.
Lewis CarrollRead