One of the things that was really an issue was I did not want to just be a woman secretary of state. I wanted to be a secretary of a state who was a woman, but not just chosen for that particular reason.

God tells us not to judge one another, no matter what anyone’s sexual preferences are or if they’re black, brown or purple.

We need every person on Earth to acknowledge that climate change is real and encourage each other and our leaders to address the challenge.

I just think overall there’s not as many female ministers than there are male ministers.

The world is before you and you need not take it or leave it as it was when you came in.

I was not a messiah, but an ordinary man who had become a leader because of extraordinary circumstances.

What spectacle can be more edifying or more seasonable, than that of Liberty and Learning, each leaning on the other for their mutual and surest support?

What we know is that when girls don’t go to school, they earn lower salaries. They get married earlier. They have higher infant and maternal mortality rates. And they’re more likely to contract HIV, less likely to immunize their children.

I speak to the black experience, but I am always talking about the human condition.

In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place, oblige it to control itself.

In action a great heart is the chief qualification. In work, a great head.

Always make those above you feel comfortably superior. In your desire to please or impress them, do not go too far in displaying your talents or you might accomplish the opposite – inspire fear and insecurity.

All these walls that keep us from loving each other as one family or one race – racism, religion, where we grew up, whatever, class, socioeconomic – what makes us be so selfish and prideful, what keeps us from wanting to help the next man, what makes us be so focused on a personal legacy as opposed to the entire legacy of a race.

Bring them on.

My goal is just to be respected as a man when I walk down the street with my family. I don’t care what your job is, you’re not gonna talk down to me, you’re not gonna try to get a rise out of me. I’m a man first. And in establishing that, some interesting things have happened.

Never forget the three powerful resources you always have available to you: love, prayer, and forgiveness.

Leadership to me means duty, honor, country. It means character, and it means listening from time to time.

The time comes upon every public man when it is best for him to keep his lips closed.

In oneself lies the whole world and if you know how to look and learn, the door is there and the key is in your hand. Nobody on earth can give you either the key or the door to open, except yourself.

If you don’t like how things are, change it! You’re not a tree.

As his vice president for eight years, I learned more from Ronald Reagan than from anyone I encountered in all my years of public life.

I can make more generals, but horses cost money.

A president either is constantly on top of events or, if he hesitates, events will soon be on top of him. I never felt that I could let up for a moment.

I was a proponent of the ERA. The women of my generation and my daughter’s generation, they were very active in moving along the social change that would result in equal citizenship stature for men and women.

He who is brave is free.

To such an extent does nature delight and abound in variety that among her trees there is not one plant to be found which is exactly like another; and not only among the plants, but among the boughs, the leaves and the fruits, you will not find one which is exactly similar to another.

Let us be shy no longer. Let us go to our strength. Let us offer hope. Let us tell the world that a new age is not only possible but probable.

I heard that when Christina Aguilera went back to her prom, people, like, booed her. I can’t imagine going through that. If you know that’s going to happen, why put yourself in that situation? I’d rather play for 20,000 screaming people, you know?

I’m no leader; I’m a little humble follower.

All of us are mentors. You’re mentors right here and now. And one of the things I’ve always done throughout my life, I have always found that person, that group of people that I was going to reach my hand out and help bring them along with me.

I’m afraid that everything will get homogenized and be the same.

When you give everyone a voice and give people power, the system usually ends up in a really good place. So, what we view our role as, is giving people that power.

India has 2,000,000 gods and worships them all. In religion, all other countries are paupers; India is the only millionaire.

Part of our tradition as black women is that we are universalists. Black children, yellow children, red children, brown children, that is the black woman’s normal, day-to-day relationship. In my family alone, we are about four different colors.

In the long history of the world, only a few generations have been granted the role of defending freedom in its hour of maximum danger. I do not shrink from this responsibility – I welcome it.

It is better to be feared than loved, if you cannot be both.

When there is a lack of honor in government, the morals of the whole people are poisoned.

We need an adult in the White House. When making life-or-death, war-or-peace decisions, a president can’t just pop off or lash out irrationally.

I think, in politics, half the people are gonna like you, and half the people are not gonna like you, no matter what you do or what you say… It’s like there are no right answers. If there were, everyone would choose the right answers. They’re all opinions.

The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted.

Every man gotta right to decide his own destiny.

It is time for parents to teach young people early on that in diversity there is beauty and there is strength.

I will only hire someone to work directly for me if I would work for that person. It’s a pretty good test.

When I get up and work out, I’m working out just as much for my girls as I am for me, because I want them to see a mother who loves them dearly, who invests in them, but who also invests in herself. It’s just as much about letting them know as young women that it is okay to put yourself a little higher on your priority list.

What Britain needs is an iron lady.

A gender line… helps to keep women not on a pedestal, but in a cage.

The wisest have the most authority.

In the long-run every Government is the exact symbol of its People, with their wisdom and unwisdom; we have to say, Like People like Government.

Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts.

It’s always interesting about God because it’s like all of the religions in the world say that they pray to the same God, and yet they ask that same one God to divide itself up and agree with this one and fight against that one.

I know how to swim through backlash. I can tread water through backlash… If anything, that’s all giving me power.

My own eight children all march to the beat of their inner music, and in some cases, it is definitely far away from what I hear. I’ve had to honor their instincts and their choices, and merely guided them out of harm’s way until they could be their own guides.

Sometimes it is better to light a flamethrower than curse the darkness.

The diversity of India, of our civilization, is actually a thing of beauty, which is something we are extremely proud of.

You think that the heads of state only have serious conversations, but they actually often begin really with the weather or, ‚I really like your tie.‘

People want to listen to a message, word from Jah. This could be passed through me or anybody. I am not a leader. Messenger. The words of the songs, not the person, is what attracts people.

I am my own sanctuary and I can be reborn as many times as I choose throughout my life.

The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.

I actually feel more of a woman because I feel like I’m being smart about my choices, and I’m putting my family first, and I’m in charge of my life and my health. I think that’s what makes a woman complete.

There are some women I definitely would not want to succeed me… but a man like David Souter, that would be great.

Let me tell you what I literally told every world leader I’ve met with, and I’ve met them all: It’s never, never, never been a good bet to bet against America. We have the finest fighting force in the world.