William Faulkner Quotes

Never be afraid to raise your voice for honesty and truth and compassion against injustice and lying and greed. If people all over the world...would do this, it would change the earth.

June Jordan, who died of cancer in 2002, was a brilliant, fierce, radical, and frequently furious poet. We were friends for thirty years. Not once in that time did she step back from what was transpiring politically and morally in the world. She spoke up, and led her students, whom she adored, to do the same.

A different world cannot be built by indifferent people.

I am always in awe of people who devote their lives to a good cause and are brave enough to take a stance, though it may be controversial in their time.

What's right and good doesn't come naturally. You have to stand up and fight for it - as if the cause depends on you, because it does.

Say what you know, do what you must, come what may.

There is little more powerful than when truth joins action.

To tell the truth is revolutionary.

Now all we need is to continue to speak the truth fearlessly, and we shall add to our number those who will turn the scale to the side of equal and full justice in all things.

Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not.

When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful.

When your heart speaks to you about what you need to do to sustain life on this planet, listen to it, make a difference, and be an inspiration for generations to come. Be inspired by people like Gandhi, Mother Teresa, Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, Christopher Reeve, Albert Schweitzer, Helen Keller, and many others.

There's a gap somehow between empathy and activism. Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. spoke of 'soul force' - something that emanates from a deep truth inside of us and empowers us to act. Once you identify your inner genius, you will be able to take action, whether it's writing a check or digging a well.

The world changes in direct proportion to the number of people willing to be honest about their lives.

I never lie because I don't fear anyone. You only lie when you're afraid.

I try to be as honest about what I see and to speak rather than be silent, especially if it means I can save lives, or serve humanity.

It is people's willingness to take personal risks and confront the powerful by daring to speak the truth, not the truth itself, that ultimately leads to change.

Those who protest at injustice are people of true merit.

Speaking truth to power is never going to be easy.

A single seemingly powerless person who dares to cry out the word of truth and to stand behind it with all his person and all his life, has, surprisingly, greater power, though formally disenfranchised, than do thousands of anonymous voters.

Today we need a special kind of courage. Not the kind needed in battle, but a kind which makes us stand up for everything that we know is right, everything that is true and honest. We need the kind of courage that can withstand the subtle corruption of the cynics, so that we can show the world that we are not afraid of the future.

Telling the truth -- telling thoughtful truths -- should not be a revolutionary act. Speaking truths to power should not be sacrificial, but they are. But I think if more of us chose to do this for the greater good, we'd be in better spaces than we are right now.

Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.

Every person remembers some moment in their life where they witnessed some injustice, big or small, and looked away because the consequences of intervening seemed too intimidating. But there's a limit to the amount of incivility and inequality and inhumanity that each individual can tolerate. I crossed that line. And I'm no longer alone.

In 'Healing the Soul of America,' I wrote about Gandhi's notion of soul force in politics and why it matters to stand on your truth.