“A little bit of mercy makes the world less cold and more just.”
“Where … do universal human rights begin? In small places, close to home—so close and so small that they cannot be seen on any maps of the world. Such are the places where every man, woman, and child seeks equal justice, equal opportunity, equal dignity without discrimination. Unless these rights have meaning there, they have little meaning anywhere.”
“Indeed, the test of orderliness in a country is not the number of millionaires it owns, but the absence of starvation among its masses.”
“To love. To be loved.
To never forget your own insignificance.
To never get used to the unspeakable violence and the vulgar disparity of life around you.
To seek joy in the saddest places.
To pursue beauty to its lair.
To never simplify what is complicated or complicate what is simple.
To respect strength, never power.
Above all, to watch.
To try and understand.
To never look away.
And never, never to forget.”
“There can be no keener revelation of a society’s soul, then the way it treats its children.”
“Sometimes the poorest woman leaves her children the richest inheritance.”
“People are often unreasonable, illogical and self-centred: Forgive them anyway.
If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives: Be kind anyway.
If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies: Succeed anyway.
If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you. Be honest and frank anyway.
If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous: Be happy anyway.
The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow: Do good anyway.
Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough: Give the world the best you’ve got anyway.
You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and God:
It was never between you and them anyway.”
“So I grew up feeling that I wasn’t good enough, and that no-one would love me unless I was perfect. But no-one’s perfect, we’re not meant to be perfect. We’re meant to be complete. But it’s hard to be complete if you’re trying to be perfect, so you kind of become disembodied. And I spent a lot of my life that way.” ” And if you don’t own your strength… Women like me tend to always look over their shoulder to see who… “Who’s the leader? Who’s the smart one?” Never thinking it might be ME. Took a long time for me to get over that.”
“The day will come when men will recognise women as their peer, not only at the fireside, but in councils of the nation. Then, and not until then, will there be the perfect comradeship, the ideal union between the sexes that shall result in the highest development of the race.”
“The very essence of leadership is [ that] you have a vision. It’s got to be a vision you articulate clearly and forcefully on every occasion. You can’t blow an uncertain trumpet.”