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# 2022-07-10 - Up From Slavery by Booker T. Washington
A family member recommended this autobiography to me. I enjoyed
reading it, and was impressed by the character, maturity, and
resourcefulness demonstrated by the author. Below are a few quotes
that made an impression on me.
# Introduction
> His own teaching at Tuskegee is unique. He lectures to his
> advanced students on the art of right living, not out of
> text-books, but straight out of life. ... Education is not a thing
> apart from life--not a "system," nor a philosophy; it is direct
> teaching how to live and how to work. --Walter H. Page.
# Chapter 3, The Struggle For An Education
> The older I grow, the more I am convinced that there is no
> education which one can get from books and costly apparatus that is
> equal to that which can be gotten from contact with great men and
> women. Instead of studying books so constantly, how I wish that
> our schools and colleges might learn to study [people] and things!
# Chapter 8, Teaching School In A Stable And A Hen-House
> Of one thing I felt more strongly convinced than ever, after
> spending this month in seeing the actual life of the colored
> people, and that was that, in order to lift them up, something must
> be done more than merely to imitate New England education as it
> then existed.
Of his two staunchest supporters, one was an ex-slave and the other
an ex-slave owner. Throughout this book, the author gives examples
of increasing harmony between survivors of old divisions.
# Chapter 10, A Harder Task Than Making Bricks Without Straw
> My experience is that there is something in human nature which
> always makes an individual recognize and reward merit, no matter
> under what color of skin merit is found. I have found, too, that
> it is the visible, the tangible, that goes a long ways in softening
> prejudices.
Chapter 11, Making Their Beds Before They Could Lie On Them
> From his example in this respect I learned the lesson that great
> men cultivate love, and that only little men cherish a spirit of
> hatred. I learned that assistance given to the weak makes the one
> who gives it strong; and that oppression of the unfortunate makes
> one weak.
> Few things help an individual more than to place responsibility
> upon [her or] him, and to let [her or] him know that you trust [her
> or] him. When I have read of labor troubles between employers and
> employees, I have often thought that many strikes and similar
> disturbances might be avoided if the employers would cultivate the
> habit of getting nearer to their employees, of consulting and
> advising with them, and letting them feel that the interests of the
> two are the same.
# Chapter 12, Raising Money
> In order to be successful in any kind of undertaking, I think the
> main thing is for one to grow to the point where he [or she]
> completely forgets [herself or] himself; that is, to lose [herself
> or] himself in a great cause. In proportion as one loses [herself
> or] himself in the way, in the same degree does he [or she] get the
> highest happiness out of [her or] his work.
> If no other consideration had convinced me of the value of the
> Christian life, the Christlike work which the Church of all
> denominations in America has done during the last thirty-five years
> for the elevation of the black man would have made me a Christian.
# Chapter 13, Two Thousand Miles For A Five-Minute Speech
> I early learned that it is a hard matter to convert an individual
> by abusing [her or] him, and that this is more often accomplished
> by giving credit for all the praiseworthy actions performed than by
> calling attention alone to all the evil done.
# Chapter 14, The Atlanta Exposition Address
> I do not believe that any state should make a law that permits an
> ignorant and poverty-stricken white man to vote, and prevents a
> black man in the same condition from voting. Such a law is not
> only unjust, but it will react, as all unjust laws do, in time; for
> the effect of such a law is to encourage the Negro to secure
> education and property, and at the same time it encourages the
> white man to remain in ignorance and poverty.
# Chapter 15, The Secret Of Success In Public Speaking
> The kind of reading that I have the greatest fondness for is
> biography. I like to be sure that I am reading about a real
> [person] or a real thing. I think I do not go too far when I say
> that I have read nearly every book and magazine article that has
> been written about Abraham Lincoln. In literature he is my patron
> saint.
> Somehow I like, as often as possible, to touch nature, not
> something that is artificial or an imitation, but the real thing.
> When I can leave my office in time so that I can spend thirty or
> forty minutes in spading the ground, in planting seeds, in digging
> about the plants, I feel that I am coming into contact with
> something that is giving me strength for the many duties and hard
> places that await me out in the big world. I pity the man or woman
> who has never learned to enjoy nature and to get strength and
> inspiration out of it.
# Chapter 16, Europe
> It seemed mean and selfish in me to be taking a vacation while
> others were at work, and while there was so much that needed to be
> done. From the time I could remember, I had always been at work,
> and I did not see how I could spend three or four months in doing
> nothing. The fact was that I did not know how to take a vacation.
> The second or third day out I began to sleep, and I think that I
> slept at the rate of fifteen hours a day during the remainder of
> the ten days' passage. Then it was that I began to understand how
> tired I really was. These long sleeps I kept up for a month after
> we landed on the other side.
author: Washington, Booker T., 1856-1915
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tags: biography,ebook,history,non-fiction,slave narrative
title: Up From Slavery
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(DIR) biography
(DIR) ebook
(DIR) history
(DIR) non-fiction
(DIR) slave narrative