Anna Julia Cooper

"The cause of freedom is not the cause of a race or a sect, a party or a class-it is the cause of human kind, the very birthright of humanity."

"One needs occasionally to stand aside from the hum and rush of human interests and passions to hear the voices of God."

"Each is under the most sacred obligation not to squander the material committed to him, not to sap his strength in folly and vice, and to see at the least that he delivers a product worthy the labor and cost which have been expended on him."