Howard Thurman Quotes

Commitment means that it is possible for a man to yield the nerve center of his consent to a purpose or cause, a movement or an ideal, which may be more important to him than whether he lives or dies.

Whatever may be the tensions and the stresses of a particular day, there is always lurking close at hand the trailing beauty of forgotten joy or unremembered peace.

During times of war, hatred becomes quite respectable even though it has to masquerade often under the guise of patriotism.

The movement of the Spirit of God in the hearts of men and women often calls them to act against the spirit of their times or causes them to anticipate a spirit which is yet in the making. In a moment of dedication they are given wisdom and courage to dare a deed that challenges and to kindle a hope that inspires.

The measure of a man’s estimate of your strength is the kind of weapons he feels that he must use in order to hold you fast in a prescribed place.

Love has no awareness of merit or demerit; it has no scale… Love loves; this is its nature.

There is something in every one of you that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself.

He who fears is literally delivered to destruction.

In the stillness of the quiet, if we listen, we can hear the whisper of the heart giving strength to weakness, courage to fear, hope to despair.

There is something in every one of you that waits and listens for the sound of the genuine in yourself. It is the only true guide you will ever have. And if you cannot hear it, you will all of your life spend your days on the ends of strings that somebody else pulls.

There are two questions that we have to ask ourselves. The first is ‘Where am I going?’ and the second is ‘Who will go with me?’

There must be always remaining in every life, some place for the singing of angels, some place for that which in itself is breathless and beautiful.

Twilight – a time of pause when nature changes her guard. All living things would fade and die from too much light or too much dark, if twilight were not.

There is a quiet courage that comes from an inward spring of confidence in the meaning and significance of life. Such courage is an underground river, flowing far beneath the shifting events of one’s experience, keeping alive a thousand little springs of action.

Do not be silent; there is no limit to the power that may be released through you.

Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is more people who have come alive

Jesus rejected hatred because he saw that hatred meant death to the mind, death to the spirit, and death to communion with his Father. He affirmed life; and hatred was the great denial.