It strikes me as unfair, and even in bad taste, to select a few of them for boundless admiration, attributing superhuman powers of mind and character to them. This has been my fate, and the contrast between the popular estimate of my powers and achievements and the reality is simply grotesque.
It is a very high goal which, with our weak powers, we can reach only very inadequately, but which gives a sure foundation to our aspirations and valuations.
If the rabble continues to occupy itself with you, then simply don't read that hogwash, but rather leave it for the reptile from whom it has been fabricated.
There is, however, one other human right which is infrequently mentioned but which seems to be destined to become very important: this is the right, or the duty, of the individual to abstain from cooperating in activities which he considers wrong or pernicious.
There is separation of colored people from white people in the United States. That separation is not a disease of colored people. It is a disease of white people. I do not intend to be quiet about it.
Degeneracy follows every autocratic system of violence, for violence inevitably attracts moral inferiors. Time has proven that illustrious tyrants are succeeded by scoundrels.
This subject brings me to that vilest offspring of the herd mind -- the odious militia. The man who enjoys marching in line and file to the strains of music falls below my contempt; he received his great brain by mistake -- the spinal cord would have been amply sufficient. This heroism at command, this senseless violence, this accursed bombast of patriotism -- how intensely I despise them! War is low and despicable, and I had rather be smitten to shreds than participate in such doings.
There could be no greater calamity than a permanent discord between us and the Arab people. Despite the great wrong that has been done us, we must strive for a just and lasting compromise with the Arab people Let us recall that in former times no people lived in greater friendship with us than the ancestors of these Arabs.