“Power is tolerable only on condition that it mask a substantial part of itself. Its success is proportional to its ability to hide its own mechanisms [...] For it, secrecy is not in the nature of an abuse, it is
indispensable to its operation. Not only because power imposes secrecy on those it dominates, but because [...]
“Once freedom lights its beacon in a man’s heart, even the gods are powerless against him.”
“Difficult to explain to her that the more fragile and perishable the structure, the greater the freedom to make and unmake it.”
“To know how to free oneself is nothing; the arduous thing is to know what to do with one’s freedom.”
“I had once believed that we were all masters of our fate - that we could mould our lives into any form we pleased…
I had overcome deafness and blindness sufficiently to be happy, and I supposed that anyone could come out victorious if he threw himself valiantly into life’s struggle.
But as I went more and [...]
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own. And I am not free as long as one person of Color remains chained. Nor is any one of you.”
“If you are frightened of dying and you are holding on, you will see devils tearing your life away, but if you’ve made your Peace, then the devils are really Angels, freeing you from the earth.”