“What was the use of talking about freedom if they had millions of people tethered to slums?”

“Atticus had said it was the polite thing to talk to people about what they were interested in, not about what you were interested in.”

“History is not a procession of illustrious people. It's about what happens to a people. Millions of anonymous people is what history is about.”

“It's all right to talk about "long white robes over yonder," in all of its symbolism. But ultimately people want some suits and dresses and shoes to wear down here. It's all right to talk about "streets flowing with milk and honey," but God has commanded us to be concerned about the slums down here, and his children who can't eat three square meals a day. It's all right to talk about the new Jerusalem, but one day, God's preacher must talk about the New York, the new Atlanta, the new Philadelphia, the new Los Angeles, the new Memphis, Tennessee. This is what we have to do.”

“[Brazil] needs to forget a little about New York, Manhattan, and think about its slums, its suffering people.”

“When factory farmers tell us that animals kept in 'intensive' (i. e. concentration) camps are being kindly spared the inclemency of a winter outdoors, and that calves do not mind being tethered for life on slats because they have never known anything else, an echo should start in our historical consciousness: do you remember how the childlike blackamoors were kindly spared the harsh responsibilities of freedom, how the skivvy didn't feel the hardship of scrubbing all day because she was used to it, how the poor didn't mind their slums because they had never known anything else?”

“I didn't squawk about the steak, dear. I merely said I didn't see that old horse that used to be tethered outside here.”

“Language tethers us to the world; without it we spin like atoms.”

“I have a million things to talk to you about. All I want in this world is you. I want to see you and talk. I want the two of us to begin everything from the beginning.”

“Why do people who have no idea
what they are talking about
always
talking loudest?”