Quotes / Muhammad Ali

"When you are as great as I am, it is hard to be humble."

—Muhammad Ali, Twitter post from April 29, 2009.

"My conscience won't let me go shoot my brother, or some darker people, or some poor hungry people in the mud for big powerful America. And shoot them for what? They never called me nigger, they never lynched me, they didn't put no dogs on me, they didn't rob me of my nationality, rape and kill my mother and father. ... Shoot them for what? How can I shoot them poor people? Just take me to jail."

— Muhammad Ali, refusing to be drafted during The Vietnam War, 1966.

"I'm not gonna help nobody get something my negroes don't have. If I'm gonna die, I'll die now right here fighting you, if I'm gonna die. You my enemy. My enemies are white people, not Viet Congs or Chinese or Japanese. You my opposer when I want freedom. You my opposer when I want justice. You my opposer when I want equality. You won't even stand up for me in America for my religious beliefs, and you want me to go somewhere and fight, but you won't even stand up for me here at home."

— Muhammad Ali, to some college students who claimed his opposition of being drafted was cowardly, 1967.

"One son and seven mistakes"

— Muhammad Ali, when asked how many children he had during a visit to China.

"I done wrestled with an alligator

I done tussled with a whale

Handcuffed lightning

Thrown thunder in jail

Only last week, I murdered a rock

Injured a stone

Hospitalized a brick

I'm so mean I make medicine sick!"

—Muhammad Ali, 1974

"I'll tell you how I'd like to be remembered: As a black man who won the heavyweight title - Who was humorous and who never looked down on those who looked up to him - A man who stood for freedom, justice and equality - And I wouldn't even mind if folks forgot how pretty I was."

—Muhammad Ali, Facebook post from July 26, 2012.

"I know I'm great, but can I tell you something? In this situation, every head must bow, every tongue must confess, Ali is the greatest of all time."

—Mike Tyson on the Arsenio Hall show, 1989

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