I Laugh Because I Must Not Cry,

If I Were To Try To Read, Much Less Answer, All The Attacks Made On Me, This Shop Might As Well Be Closed For Any Other Business. I Do The Very Best I Know How - The Very Best I Can; And I Mean To Keep Doing So Until The End. If The End Brings Me Out All Right, What's Said Against Me Won't Amount To Anything. If The End Brings Me Out Wrong, Ten Angels Swearing I Was Right Would Make No Difference.

Am I Not Destroying My Enemies When I Make Friends Of Them?

I Will Say, Then, That I Am Not, Nor Ever Have Been, In Favor Of Bringing About In Any Way The Social And Political Equality Of The White And Black Races: That I Am Not, Nor Ever Have Been, In Favor Of Making Voters Or Jurors Of Negroes, Nor Of Qualifying Them To Hold Office, Nor To Intermarry With White People.

I Am Now The Most Miserable Man Living. If What I Feel Equally Distributed To The Whole Human Family, There Would Not Be One Cheerful Face On The Earth. Whether I Shall Ever Be Better, I Cannot Tell; I Awfully Forebode I Shall Not. To Remain As I Am Is Impossible. I Must Die Or Be Better, It Appears To Me.

I Remember My Mother's Prayers And They Have Always Followed Me. They Have Clung To Me All My Life.