Benjamin E. Mays famous quotes

04-17-2025

It must be borne in mind that the tragedy of life doesn't lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goals to reach.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Lying #Goal #Mind
The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Lying #Goal #Tragedy
The tragedy of life doesn't lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach. It isn't a calamity to die with dreams unfulfilled, but it is a calamity not to dream...It is not a disgrace not to reach the stars, but it is a disgrace to have no stars to reach for. Not failure, but low aim is sin.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Dream #Stars #Lying
He who starts behind in the great race of life must forever remain behind or run faster than the man in front.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Running #Men #Race
The tragedy of this life is not failure, but low aim.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Tragedy #Life Is #Lows
Every man and woman is born into the world to do something unique and something distinctive and if he or she does not do it, it will never be done.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Unique #Men #Doe
We, today, stand on the shoulders of our predecessors who have gone before us. We, as their successors, must catch the torch of freedom and liberty passed on to us by our ancestors. We cannot lose in this battle.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Battle #Liberty #Torches
Honest communication is built on truth and integrity and upon respect of the one for the other.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Integrity #Communication #Honest
It isn't a disgrace not to reach the stars, but it is a disgrace to have no stars to reach for.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Stars #Disgrace
It isn't a calamity to die with dreams unfulfilled, but it is a calamity not to dream.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Dream #Calamity
You have the ability, now apply yourself.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Ability
It isn't more light we need, it isn't more truth, and it isn't more scientific data. It is more Christ, more courage, more spiritual insight to act on the light we have.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#God #Spiritual #Light
The creation of the spiritual was no accident. It was a creation born of necessity, so that the slave might more adequately adjust himself to the conditions of the New World.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Spiritual #World #Slavery
I believe everyone is born into the world to do something unique and distinctive.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Life #Believe #Unique
The tragedy of life is not found in failure but complacency. Not in you doing too much, but doing too little. Not in you living above your means, but below your capacity. It's not failure but aiming too low, that is life's greatest tragedy.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Leadership #Mean #Tragedy
In this perilous world, if a black boy wanted to live a halfway normal life and die a natural death he had to learn early the art of how to get along with white folks.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Art #Boys #White
A child must learn early to believe that she is somebody worthwhile, and that she can do many praiseworthy things.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Inspirational #Children #Believe
Failure isn't in not reaching your goal but in having no goal to reach.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Swimming #Goal #Reaching
Whatever you do,strive to do it so well that no man living and no man dead and no man yet to be born could do it any better.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Men #Strive #Born
It is not a disaster to be unable to capture your ideal, but it is a disaster to have no ideal to capture.
-- Benjamin E. Mays

#Disaster #Capture

You may also like:

A. Philip Randolph
American Political leader
Abraham Lincoln
16th U.S. President
Andrew Young
Former Mayor of Atlanta
Bayard Rustin
Activist
Benjamin Hooks
Minister
Charlayne Hunter-Gault
Journalist
Henry David Thoreau
Author
Howard Thurman
Author
Ivan Allen, Jr.
Businessman
Joe Torry
Actor
Leo Tolstoy
Writer
Lester Maddox
American Politician
Mahatma Gandhi
Lawyer
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Civil rights activist
Maynard Jackson
Former Mayor of Atlanta
Mordecai Wyatt Johnson
Theodore Parker
Vernon Jordan
Eugene Talmadge
Politician
Hosea Williams
Minister