From the very first, it has been the educated and intelligent of the Negro people that have led and elevated the mass, and the sole obstacles that nullified and retarded their efforts were slavery and race prejudice; for what is slavery but the legalized survival of the unfit and the nullification of the work of natural internal leadership?
— W. E. B. Du Bois
Most men today cannot conceive of a freedom that does not involve somebody's slavery.
But what of black women?... I most sincerely doubt if any other race of women could have brought its fineness up through so devilish a fire.
Education is that whole system of human training within and without the school house walls, which molds and develops men.
When you have mastered numbers, you will in fact no longer be reading numbers, any more than you read words when reading books You will be reading meanings.
Every argument for Negro suffrage is an argument for women's suffrage.
Read some good, heavy, serious books just for discipline: Take yourself in hand and master yourself.
I believe in Liberty for all men: the space to stretch their arms and their souls, the right to breathe and the right to vote, the freedom to choose their friends, enjoy the sunshine, and ride on the railroads, uncursed by color; thinking, dreaming, working as they will in a kingdom of beauty and love.
A system of education is not one thing, nor does it have a single definite object, nor is it a mere matter of schools. Education is that whole system of human training within and without the school house walls, which molds and develops men.
The Negro race, like all races, is going to be saved by its exceptional men. The problem of education, then, among Negroes must first of all deal with the Talented Tenth; it is the problem of developing the Best of this race that they may guide the Mass away from the contamination and death of the Worst, in their own and other races.
A little less complaint and whining, and a little more dogged work and manly striving, would do us more credit than a thousand civil rights bills.
It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others, of measuring one's soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity.
The power of the ballot we need in sheer defense, else what shall save us from a second slavery?
A classic is a book that doesn't have to be written again.
To be a poor man is hard, but to be a poor race in a land of dollars is the very bottom of hardships.
I believe in God, who made of one blood all nations that on earth do dwell. I believe that all men, black and brown and white, are brothers, varying through time and opportunity, in form and gift and feature, but differing in no essential particular, and alike in soul and the possibility of infinite development.
To stimulate wildly weak and untrained minds is to play with mighty fires.
Education must not simply teach work - it must teach Life.
If there is anybody in this land who thoroughly believes that the meek shall inherit the earth they have not often let their presence be known.
The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line.
The cost of liberty is less than the price of repression.
For most people, it is enough for the world to know that they aspire. The world does not ask what their aspirations are, trusting that those aspirations are for the best and greatest things. But with regard to the Negroes in America, there is a feeling that their aspirations in some way are not consistent with the great ideals.
One ever feels his twoness - an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.
An American, a Negro... two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn asunder.
Believe in life! Always human beings will live and progress to greater, broader, and fuller life.
