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My luck at the gambling table was varied sometimes I was fifty to a hundred dollars ahead, and at other times I had to borrow money from my fellow workmen to settle my room rent and pay for my meals.

James Weldon Johnson

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James Weldon Johnson
Age: 67 †
Born: 1871
Born: June 17
Died: 1938
Died: June 26
Author
Composer
Diplomat
Jurist
Lawyer
Novelist
Poet
Politician
Songwriter
Writer
Jacksonville
Florida
J. W. Johnson
Times
Fellows
Gambling
Money
Ahead
Settle
Sometimes
Luck
Settling
Dollars
Meals
Hundred
Fellow
Workmen
Pay
Fifty
Varied
Room
Table
Borrow
Rooms
Tables
Rent

More quotes by James Weldon Johnson

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As yet, the Negroes themselves do not fully appreciate these old slave songs.
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It’s no disgrace to be black, but it’s often very inconvenient.
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It is strange how in some things honest people can be dishonest without the slightest compunction.
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When one has seen something of the world and human nature, one must conclude, after all, that between people in like stations of life there is very little difference the world over.
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I finally made up my mind that I would neither disclaim the black race nor claim the white race but that I would change my name, raise a mustache, and let the world take me for what it would that it was not necessary for me to go about with a label of inferiority pasted across my forehead.
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And God stepped out on space, and He looked around and said: I'm lonely - I'll make me a world.
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Through my music teaching and my not absolutely irregular attendance at church, I became acquainted with the best class of colored people in Jacksonville.
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Northern white people love the Negro in a sort of abstract way, as a race through a sense of justice, charity, and philanthropy, they will liberally assist in his elevation.
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In the life of everyone there is a limited number of experiences which are not written upon the memory, but stamped there with a die and in the long years after, they can be called up in detail, and every emotion that was stirred by them can be lived through anew these are the tragedies of life.
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...evil is a force and, like the physical and chemical forces, we cannot annihilate it we may only change its form. We light upon one evil and hit it with all the might of our civilization, but only succeed in scattering it into a dozen of other forms
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When we arrived in London, my sadness at leaving Paris was turned into despair. After my long stay in the French capital, huge, ponderous, massive London seemed to me as ugly a thing as man could contrive to make.
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At a very early age I began to thump on the piano alone, and it was not long before I was able to pick out a few tunes? I also learned the names of the notes in both clefs, but I preferred not be hampered by notes.
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This country can have no more democracy than it accords and guarantees to the humblest and weakest citizen.
James Weldon Johnson
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In Berlin I especially enjoyed the orchestral concerts, and I attended a large number of them. I formed the acquaintance of a good many musicians, several of whom spoke of my playing in high terms.
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And Satan smiled, stretched out his hand, and said, O War, of all the scourges of humanity, I crown you chief.
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There are a great many colored people who are ashamed of the cake-walk, but I think they ought to be proud of it.
James Weldon Johnson
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O Black and unknown bards of long ago, How came your lips to touch the sacred fire?
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And so for a couple of years my life was divided between my music and my school books.
James Weldon Johnson
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Make yourself as happy as possible, and try to make those happy whose lives come in touch with yours. But to attempt to right the wrongs and cease the sufferings of the world in general is a waste of effort.
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So God stepped over to the edge of the world And He spat out the seven seas He batted His eyes, and the lightnings flashed He clapped His hands, and the thunders rolled And the waters above the earth came down, The cooling waters came down.
James Weldon Johnson