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Then The Question Began To Live Under My Blankets: How Did Lesbianism Begin? What Were The Symptoms? The Public Library Gave Information On The Finished Lesbian--and That Woefully Sketchy--but On The Growth Of A Lesbian, There Was Nothing. I Did Discover That The Difference Between Hermaphrodites And Lesbians Was That Hermaphrodites Were "born That Way." It Was Impossible To Determine Whether Lesbians Budded Gradually, Or Burst Into Being With A Suddenness That Dismayed Them As Much As It Repelled Society.

-Maya Angelou

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Then The Question Began

Maya Angelou

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Then The Question Began To Live Under My Blankets: How Did Lesbianism Begin? What Were The Symptoms? The Public Library Gave Information On The Finished Lesbian--and That Woefully Sketchy--but On The Growth Of A Lesbian, There Was Nothing. I Did Discover That The Difference Between Hermaphrodites And Lesbians Was That Hermaphrodites Were "born That Way." It Was Impossible To Determine Whether Lesbians Budded Gradually, Or Burst Into Being With A Suddenness That Dismayed Them As Much As It Repelled Society.

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I'm A Serious Aficionada Of Country Music - Reba Mcentire, Toby Keith, Montgomery Gentry. I've Even Written Some Songs. They Haven't Done Anything Of Mine Yet. But It's Only A Matter Of Time.

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The Only Way You Can Be A Mark Is If You Want Something For Nothing. If You're Greedy, You're Set Up.

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I Like Good Food. People Want A Certain Taste, But When They're Offered Something Else, They'll Overeat. If They Really Are Looking For Chicken And Someone Gives Them Pork Chops, They'll Say, "i Will Have Another." And That's Because Their Satisfaction Is Not Reached. So I Thought I Would Make Great Food, But Eat Less Of It. I Tried It And I've Taken Off Over 40 Pounds.

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I Am Grateful To Be A Woman. I Must Have Done Something Great In Another Life.

You May Not Get What You Paid For, But You Will Pay For What You Get.

If You Have Done The Best You Can Do And If You Have Gotten All You Could Extract From Something, You Have Given All You Had To Give, Then The Time Has Come When You Can Do No More Than Say Thank You And Move On.

Have Enough Courage To Trust Love One More Time And Always One More Time.

As A Nurse, We Have The Opportunity To Heal The Heart, Mind, Soul And Body Of Our Patients, Their Families And Ourselves. They May Not Remember Your Name But They Will Never Forget The Way You Made Them Feel.

Everybody In The World Wants The Same Thing...to Be Needed...a Job That He/she Can Do Well...to Love Somebody...everybody...there's No Mystery.

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If You Have Only One Smile In You Give It To The People You Love.

Martin Luther King Was A Human Being With A Brilliant Mind, A Powerful Heart, And Insight, And Courage And Also With A Sense Of Humor. So He Was Accessible.

Money And Power Can Liberate Only If They Are Used To Do So. They Can Imprison And Inhibit More Finally Than Barred Windows And Iron Chains.

The Fact That The Adult American Negro Female Emerges A Formidable Character Is Often Met With Amazement, Distaste And Even Belligerance. It Is Seldom Accepted As An Inevitable Outcome Of The Struggle Won By Survivors, And Deserves Respect If Not Enthusiastic Acceptance.

Every Journey Begins With A Single Step.

I've Had Rainbows In My Clouds.

I Pray For Humility Because That Comes From Inside Out. And What Humility Does For One, Is It Reminds Us That There Are People Before Me. I Have Already Been Paid For. And What I Need To Do Is Prepare Myself So That I Can Pay For Someone Else Who Has Yet To Come, But Who May Be Here And Needs Me.

I Am A Woman Phenomenally, Phenomenal Woman That Is Your Grandmother, That Is Your Mother, That Is Your Sister, That Is You And That Is Me.

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Women Been Gittin' Pregnant Ever Since Eve Ate That Apple.

Talent Is Like Electricity. We Don't Understand Electricity. We Use It.

To Be Left Alone On The Tightrope Of Youthful Unknowing Is To Experience The Excruciating Beauty Of Full Freedom And The Threat Of Eternal Indecision.

I Had Read A Tale Of Two Cities And Found It Up To My Standards As A Romantic Novel. She Opened The First Page And I Heard Poetry For The First Time In My Life...her Voice Slid In And Curved Down Trough And Over The Words. She Was Nearly Singing.

I Believe That The Most Important Single Thing, Beyond Discipline And Creativity Is Daring To Dare.

Don't Hesitate To Learn The Most Painful Aspects Of Our History, Understand It.

The Best Candy Shop A Child Can Be Left Alone In, Is The Library

Love Liberates. It Doesn't Just Hold, That's Ego. Love Liberates.

The Truth Will Lead Me To All.

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Through The Centuries, We Faced Down Death By Daring To Hope.

Y’all Dropped The Ball And You Should Be Shamed.

I Encourage Courtesy. To Accept Nothing Less Than Courtesy, And To Give Nothing Less Than Courtesy.

That's What You Want To Do? Then Nothing Beats A Trial But A Failure. Give It Everything You've Got. I've Told You Many Times, 'cant Do Is Like Dont Care.' Neither Of Them Have A Home.

Life Loves The Liver Of It.

Few, If Any, Survive Their Teens. Most Surrender To The Vague But Murderous Pressure Of Adult Conformity.

When I'm Writing, I Am Trying To Find Out Who I Am, Who We Are, What We're Capable Of, How We Feel, How We Lose And Stand Up, And Go On From Darkness Into Darkness.

You Forgive Yourself For Every Failure Because You Are Trying To Do The Right Thing. God Knows That And You Know It. Nobody Else May Know It.

To Describe My Mother Would Be To Write About A Hurricane In Its Perfect Power. Or The Climbing, Falling Colors Of A Rainbow.

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I'm Not Sure If Resilience Is Ever Achieved Alone. Experience Allows Us To Learn From Example. But If We Have Someone Who Loves Us-i Don't Mean Who Indulges Us, But Who Loves Us Enough To Be On Our Side-then It's Easier To Grow Resilience, To Grow Belief In Self, To Grow Self-esteem. And It's Self-esteem That Allows A Person To Stand Up.

Modesty Is A Learned Affectation. It's No Good. Humility Is Great, Because Humility Says, 'there Was Someone Before Me. I'm Following In Somebody's Footsteps.'

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On This Platform Of Peace, We Can Create A Language To Translate Ourselves To Ourselves And To Each Other.

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I Long For The Time When All Human History Is Taught As One History, Because It Really Is.

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Pretty Women Wonder Where My Secret Lies. I'm Not Cute Or Built To Suit A Fashion Model's Size But When I Start To Tell Them, They Think I'm Telling Lies. I Say, It's In The Reach Of My Arms The Span Of My Hips, The Stride Of My Step, The Curl Of My Lips. I'm A Woman Phenomenally. Phenomenal Woman, That's Me.

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I Believe What I Have To Say Is Important, And I Believe The People Coming To Hear Me Are Important, And So The Occasion Of Itself Alone Has An Importance, Which Forces Me To Stare Down My Nerves.

If You're For The Right Thing, You Do It Without Thinking.

You Can Only Become Great At Something You Are Willing To Sacrifice For

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We Really Are 15 Countries, And It's Remarkable That Each Of Us Thinks We Represent The Real America. The Midwesterner In Kansas, The Black American In Durham - Both Are Certain They Are The Real American.

Early On, I Was So Impressed With Charles Dickens. I Grew Up In The South, In A Little Village In Arkansas, And The Whites In My Town Were Really Mean, And Rude. Dickens, I Could Tell, Wouldn't Be A Man Who Would Curse Me Out And Talk To Me Rudely.

I Think Clinton, After Getting Into Office And Into Washington, Was Shocked At Being Bludgeoned. So He Spent Time Trying To Be All Things To All People - One Way Guaranteed Not To Be Successful Or Respected In A Lion's Den. You Can't Just Play Around With All Those Big Cats - You've Got To Take Somebody On.

Most People Don't Grow Up. Most People Age. They Find Parking Spaces, Honor Their Credit Cards, Get Married, Have Children, And Call That Maturity. What That Is, Is Aging.

Words Mean More Than What Is Set Down On Paper. It Takes The Human Voice To Infuse Them With Deeper Meaning.

If I Wanted To Write, I Had To Be Willing To Develop A Kind Of Concentration Found Mostly In People Awaiting Execution. I Had To Learn Technique And Surrender My Ignorance.

There Is A Very Fine Line Between Loving Life And Being Greedy For It.

I Did Then What I Knew How To Do. Now That I Know Better, I Do Better.

We Are More Alike Than Unalike.

Everybody Is Worth Everything.

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Poetry Gave Me Back My Voice.

I Love The Song 'i Hope You Dance' By Lee Ann Womack. I Was Going To Write That Song, But Someone Beat Me To It.

I Want To Write So Well That A Person Is 30 Or 40 Pages In A Book Of Mine ... Before She Realizes She's Reading.

Money And Power Can Liberate Only If They Are Used To Do So. They Can Imprison And Inhibit More Finally Than Barred Windows And Iron Chains.

All Men Are Prepared To Accomplish The Incredible If Their Ideals Are Threatened.

If Our Children Are To Approve Of Themselves, They Must See That We Approve Of Ourselves.

Shelter Network's Programs And Services Are A Rainbow In The Clouds For Homeless Children And Adults.

A Societies Needs Determines Their Ethics

I Am Not Competing With Anyone Other Than Myself. I Want To Be Excellent At Whatever I Do.

This Conference ? Of, For And About Women ? Is, In Itself, A Rainbow In The Clouds. When Numerous Women Come Together And Show That They Care, Not Only For Themselves But Also For Each Other, That Is The Occasion When A Rainbow Is Shining Down On Somebody Else.

One Must Learn To Care For Oneself First, So That One Can Then Dare To Care For Someone Else.

Sunday, If I'm Lucky, I'll Go To Church Or Listen To Some Good Spiritual Advice On The Television Or On The Radio. I Take Three Or Four Baths To Try To Cleanse Myself, So I'm Fresh For Monday.

I Love The Melodies In The Old Testament, How Preachers Highlight Them When They Read From The Scripture. But I Was Influenced Forever By The New Testament. I Love The Beatitudes, Informing Us That The Meek Shall Inherit The Earth.

I Do Not Trust People Who Don't Love Themselves And Yet Tell Me, 'i Love You.' There Is An African Saying Which Is: Be Careful When A Naked Person Offers You A Shirt.

There's Racism And Sexism And Ageism And All Sorts Of Idiocies. But Bad News Is Not News. We've Had Bad News As A Species For A Long Time. We've Had Slavery And Human Sacrifice And The Holocaust And Brutalities Of Such Measure.

Original Thinking Migrates Each Day In Search Of Nourishment.

I Don't Think There's Such A Thing As Autobiographical Fiction. If I Say It Happened, It Happened, Even If Only In My Mind.

If I Am Not Good To Myself, How Can I Expect Anyone Else To Be Good To Me?

My Son Is The Best Thing That Ever Happened To Me. And Through Me - To A Lot Of People.

Best Thing That Ever Happened To Me

Listen To Some Good Poetry. You See? It Keeps Us From Thinking We Are Only What Our Blatant Appetites Describe Us As.

We Grow Despite The Horror That We Feed Upon Our Own Tomorrow. We Grow.

If Funkytown Was A Trailerpark, This Guy Would Be A Double-wide.

It's Amazing. I Can Do Anything. And Do It Well. Any Good Thing, I Can Do It. That's Why I Am Who I Am, Yes, Because God Loves Me And I'm Amazed At It. I'm Grateful For It.

Bitterness Is Like Cancer. It Eats Upon The Host. But Anger Is Like Fire. It Burns It All Clean.

I Believe That People Want The Scent Of Love, More Than Anything Else. And I Don't Mean Sentimentality, I Don't Mean Mush. I Mean That Idea, That Human Beings Are More Alike Than We Are Different. And That Means That I Can Love You. I Don't Mean Support You In Bad Things You Do, That I Can Understand Because You're A Human Being.

Love Is Many Things. It Is Varied. One Thing Love Is Not, Is Unsure.

Because Of Our Routines We Forget That Life Is An Ongoing Adventure.

Without Willing It, I Had Gone From Being Ignorant Of Being Ignorant To Being Aware Of Being Aware. And The Worst Part Of My Awareness Was That I Didn't Know What I Was Aware Of. I Knew I Knew Very Little, But I Was Certain That The Things I Had Yet To Learn Wouldn't Be Taught To Me At George Washington High School.

Make Every Effort To Change Things You Do Not Like. If You Cannot Make A Change, Change The Way You Have Been Thinking. You Might Find A New Solution.

Today, The First & Last Of Every Tree/ Speaks To Humankind. Come To Me, Here Beside The River.

We Must Create A Climate Where People Agree That Human Beings Are More Alike Than Unalike. The Only Way To Do That Is Through Education.

My Hope Is That We Develop Enough Courage To Develop Courage. To Try To Have, Try To Learn To Treat Each Other Fairly, With Generosity And Kindness.

We All Have That Possibility, That Potential And That Promise Of Seeing Beyond The Seeming.

Like A Pianist Runs Her Fingers Over The Keys, I'll Search My Mind For What To Say. Now, The Poem May Want You To Write It. And Then Sometimes You See A Situation And Think, 'i'd Like To Write About That.' Those Are Two Different Ways Of Being Approached By A Poem, Or Approaching A Poem.

Out Of The Huts Of History's Shame I Rise.

I Have A Feeling That I Make A Very Good Friend, And I'm A Good Mother, And A Good Sister, And A Good Citizen. I Am Involved In Life Itself - All Of It. And I Have A Lot Of Energy And A Lot Of Nerve.

The Subject Of The Poem Usually Dictates The Rhythm Or The Rhyme And Its Form. Sometimes, When You Finish The Poem And You Think The Poem Is Finished, The Poem Says, "you're Not Finished With Me Yet," And You Have To Go Back And Revise, And You May Have Another Poem Altogether. It Has Its Own Life To Live.

I Come As One, But Stand As 10,000.

Some Of Us Are Timid. We Think We Have Something To Lose So We Don't Try For That Next Hill.

I Might Have It At Six-fifteen A.m. Just As Soon As I Get In, But Usually It's About Eleven O'clock When I'll Have A Glass Of Sherry.

Creativity Or Talent, Like Electricity, Is Something I Don't Understand But Something I'm Able To Harness And Use.

And If A Person Is Religious, I Think It's Good, It Helps You A Bit. But If You're Not, At Least You Can Have The Sense That There Is A Condition Inside You Which Looks At The Stars With Amazement And Awe.

The Black Female Is Assaulted In Her Tender Years By All Those Common Forces Of Nature At The Same Time She Is Caught In The Tripartite Crossfire Of Masculine Prejudice, White Illogical Hate And Black Lack Of Power.

Until Blacks And Whites See Each Other As Brother And Sister, We Will Not Have Parity. It's Very Clear.

I Want To Thank You, Lord, For Life And All That's In It. Thank You For The Day And For The Hour, And The Minute.

You May Not Control All The Events That Happen To You, But You Can Decide Not To Be Reduced By Them.

They Who Have Health Have Hope; And They Who Have Hope, Have Everything.

Take A Month And Show Some Kindness For The Folks Who Thought That Blindness Was An Illness That Affected Eyes Alone.

Only Equals Make Friends, Every Other Relationship Is Contrived And Off Balance.

No Human Being Can Be More Human Than Another Human Being. I Liberate You From My Ignorance.

African American

Thank You, Always Say Thank You; It's The Greatest Gift You Can Give Someone; Because Thank You Is What You Say To God.

Saying Thank You

There's A World Of Difference Between Truth And Facts. Facts Can Obscure The Truth.

Whether You Are Happy Or Whether You Are Sad, It Is Wise To Remember You Are Really In Process.

Independence Is A Heady Draught, And If You Drink It In Your Youth, It Can Have The Same Effect On The Brain As Young Wine Does. It Does Not Matter That Its Taste Is Not Always Appealing. It Is Addictive And With Each Drink You Want More.

Every Day Offers You 10,000 Reasons To Cry, But If You Can Find Just One Reason To Laugh Then You Will Be All Right.

You May Be Pretty Or Plain, Heavy Or Thin, Gay Or Straight, Poor Or Rich. But Remember This: In An Election, Every Voice Is Equally Powerful -- Don't Underestimate Your Vote. Voting Is The Great Equalizer.

I Never Had That Feeling That I Had To Carry The Weight Of Somebody's Ignorance Around With Me. And That Was True For Racists Who Wanted To Use The 'n' Word When Talking About Me Or About My People, Or The Stupidity Of People Who Really Wanted To Belittle Other Folks Because They Weren't Pretty Or They Weren't Rich Or They Weren't Clever.

My Great Blessing Is My Son, But I Have Daughters. I Have White Ones And Black Ones And Fat Ones And Thin Ones And Pretty Ones And Plain. I Have Gay Ones And Straight. I Have Daughters. I Have Asian Ones, I Have Jewish Ones, I Have Muslim Ones.

I'm Very Blessed That I Have A Healthy Temper. I Can Become Quite Angry And Burning In Anger, But I Have Never Been Bitter. Bitterness Is A Corrosive, Terrible Acid. It Just Eats You And Makes You Sick.

I'm Grateful To Be An American. I Am Grateful That We Can Be Angry At The Terrorist Assault And At The Same Time Be Intelligent Enough Not To Hold A Grudge Against Every Arab And Every Muslim.

Stand Up Straight And Realize Who You Are, That You Tower Over Your Circumstances. You Are A Child Of God. Stand Up Straight.

Troubles Are A Blessing That Force You To Change, To Believe.

I Think Music Is One Of The Hero/sheroes Of The African-american Existence.

African American

Precious Jewel, You Glow, You Shine, Reflecting All The Good Things In The World. Just Look At Yourself.

Precious Jewels

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings.

How Important It Is For Us To Recognize And Celebrate Our Heroes And She-roes!

I Think We All Have Empathy. We May Not Have Enough Courage To Display It.

Ask For What You Want And Be Prepared To Get It!

To Be Left Alone On The Tightrope Of Youthful Unknowing Is To Experience The Excruciating Beauty Of Full Freedom And The Threat Of Eternal Indecision. Few, If Any, Survive Their Teens. Most Surrender To The Vague But Murderous Pressure Of Adult Conformity. It Becomes Easier To Die And Avoid Conflict Than To Maintain A Constant Battle With The Superior Forces Of Maturity.

Have Enough Courage To Love.

Courage To Love

You Can't Get Too High For Somebody To Bring You Down.

We Are Not Just Flesh And Blood. And Our Hungers Are Not Going To Be Set Aside As Just Flesh And Blood.

Flesh And Blood

The Intensity With Which Young People Live Demands That They "blank Out" As Often As Possible.

My People Had Used Music To Soothe Slavery's Torment Or To Propitiate God, Or To Describe The Sweetness Of Love And The Distress Of Lovelessness, But I Knew No Race Could Sing And Dance Its Way To Freedom.

I Wasn't A Pretty Girl. I Was Six Feet Tall At 15, You Know.

I Find It Interesting That The Meanest Life, The Poorest Existence, Is Attributed To God's Will, But As Human Beings Become More Affluent, As Their Living Standard And Style Begin To Ascend The Material Scale, God Descends The Scale Of Responsibility At Commensurate Speed.

We Spend Precious Hours Fearing The Inevitable. It Would Be Wise To Use That Time Adoring Our Families, Cherishing Our Friends And Living Our Lives.

There Is A Place In You That You Must Keep Inviolate, A Place That You Must Keep Clean. A Place Where You Say To Any Intruder, "back Up, Don't You Know I'm A Child Of God.

To Be Human Is To Be Challenged To Be More Divine. Not Even To Try To Meet Such A Challenge Is The Biggest Defeat Imaginable.

The Most Called-upon Prerequisite Of A Friend Is An Accessible Ear.

Being Thankful Helps You To Be Present.people Commit Errors Because They Are Not Present.i Would Encourage Women And Men To Be Present - You'll Avoid Falling Into Certain Pits.for Instance, If You Know That A Person Has Just Lost His Wife Or Her Husband Or Lover, It's Unlikely That You Will Say Something That Will Hurt That Person's Feelings If You're Truly Paying Attention. You'll Make A Sweeter Life For Yourself And For Those Around You If You Are Present.

As Soon As Healing Takes Place, Go Out And Heal Somebody Else.

Being Thankful Helps You To Be Present.people Commit Errors Because They Are Not Present.i Would Encourage Women And Men To Be Present - You'll Avoid Falling Into Certain Pits.for Instance, If You Know That A Person Has Just Lost His Wife Or Her Husband Or Lover, It's Unlikely That You Will Say Something That Will Hurt That Person's Feelings If You're Truly Paying Attention. You'll Make A Sweeter Life For Yourself And For Those Around You If You Are Present.

Without Courage You Can't Practice Any Other Virtue Consistently.

I Believe That Every Person Is Born With Talent.

I Know Something Better Is On The Road For Me.

Something Better

I Was Raped When I Was Very Young. I Told My Brother The Name Of The Person Who Had Done It. Within A Few Days The Man Was Killed. In My Child's Mind--seven And A Half Years Old--i Thought My Voice Had Killed Him. So I Stopped Talking For Five Years.

There Is An Intimate Laughter To Be Found Only Among Friends

Inspirational Friendship

Home Is A Refuge Not Only From The World, But A Refuge From My Worries, My Troubles, My Concerns. I Like Beautiful Things Around Me. I Like To Be Beautiful Because It Delights My Eyes And My Soul Is Lifted Up.

In Order To Be Profoundly Dishonest, A Person Must Have One Of Two Qualities: Either He Is Unscrupulously Ambitious, Or He Is Unswervingly Egocentric.

African American

I Want To Thank You, Lord, For Life And All That's In It. Thank You For The Day And For The Hour, And The Minute.

I Know That When I Pray, Something Wonderful Happens. Not Just To The Person Or Persons For Whom I'm Praying, But Also Something Wonderful Happens To Me. I'm Grateful That I'm Heard.

Women Should Be Tough, Tender, Laugh As Much As Possible, And Live Long Lives.

I've Learned That You Can Tell A Lot About A Person By The Way (s)he Handles These Three Things: A Rainy Day, Lost Luggage, And Tangled Christmas Tree Lights.

There Were People Who Went To Sleep Last Night, Poor And Rich And White And Black, But They Will Never Wake Again. And Those Dead Folks Would Give Anything At All For Just Five Minutes Of This Weather Or Ten Minutes Of Plowing. So You Watch Yourself About Complaining. What You're Supposed To Do When You Don't Like A Thing Is Change It. If You Can't Change It, Change The Way You Think About It.

Perhaps Travel Cannot Prevent Bigotry, But By Demonstrating That All Peoples Cry, Laugh, Eat, Worry, And Die, It Can Introduce The Idea That If We Try And Understand Each Other, We May Even Become Friends.

I Not Only Have The Right To Stand Up For Myself, But I Have The Responsibility. I Can't Ask Somebody Else To Stand Up For Me If I Won't Stand Up For Myself. And Once You Stand Up For Yourself, You'd Be Surprised That People Say, "can I Be Of Help?".

If A Person - Any Human Being - Is Told Often Enough, "you Are Nothing. You Are Nothing. You Account For Nothing. You Count For Nothing. You Are Less Than A Human Being. I Have No Visibility Of You", The Person Finally Begins To Believe It.

I Am Never Proud To Participate In Violence, Yet I Know That Each Of Us Must Care Enough For Ourselves That We Can Be Ready And Able To Come To Our Own Defence When And Wherever Needed.

The Honorary Duty Of A Human Being Is To Love.

I Am Capable Of What Every Other Human Is Capable Of. This Is One Of The Great Lessons Of War And Life.

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