Muhammad Ali
I can't see what God's plan is. I just know I've got to live with it.Collection: God's Plan
I don't always know what I'm talking about, but I know I'm right.Collection: Talking
The whites have always had the say in America. White people made Jesus white, angels white, the Last Supper white. If I threaten you, I'm blackmailing you. A black cat is bad luck. If you're put out of a club, you're blackballed. Angel's-food cake is white; devil's-food cake is black. Good guys in cowboy movies wear white hats. The bad guys always wore black hats.Collection: Jesus
Who's gonna dare to be great?Collection: Greatness
I only read the Holy Koran, the Bible and the sports pagesCollection: Sports
He's too ugly to be the champ!Collection: Boxing
I said to myself, 'the champion of the whole world can whoop every man in Russia, every man in America, every man in China, every man in Japan, every man in Europe - every man in the whole world'.It sounds big, didn't it? So I kept working until I did it.Collection: Men
We are all God's people. We are prejudiced and we separate into Jews, Mexicans, Italians, but God doesn't see colors.Collection: Color
Eat your words! Eat your words! I am the greatest.Collection: Boxing
There is one hell of a difference between fighting in the ring and going to war in Vietnam.Collection: War
The name Muhammad is the most common name in the world. In all the countries around the world - Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon - there are more Muhammads than anything else.Collection: Country
When I heard the truth about my name was not Cassius Clay, like I knew a black man in America named John Hawkins. Now, you know who John Hawkins was.He was a slave trader from England. But the white people of that time, if one had five slaves and his name was Jones, they would be called Jones' property. [...] Now that I'm free, now that I'm no longer a slave, then I want a name of my ancestors.Collection: Men
Sometimes Howard [Cosell] makes me wish I was a dog and he was a fireplug.Collection: Dog
I shook up the world.Collection: Boxing
I'm so fast I could hit you before God gets the news.Collection: News
Scatter abroad what you have already amassed rather than pile up new wealth.Collection: Charity
I always bring out the best in men I fight, but Joe Frazier, I'll tell the world right now, brings out the best in me. I'm gonna tell ya, that's one helluva man, and God bless himCollection: Fighting
I'm sad because I want to bow out of my race and leave my beautiful identity? Chinese love Chinese. They love their little slant eyed, pale brown skinned babies. Pakistanis love their culture.Jewish people love their culture. A lot of Catholics want to marry Catholics because the want their religion to stay the same.Collection: Beautiful
I strongly object to the fact that so many newspapers have given the American public and the world the impression that I have only two alternatives in taking this stand: either I go to jail or go to the Army. There is another alternative and that alternative is justice. If justice prevails, if my Constitutional rights are upheld, I will be forced to go neither to the Army nor jail. In the end I am confident that justice will come my way for the truth must eventually prevail.Collection: Army
I'm the most recognised and loved man that ever livedCollection: Men
If the boxers are a little more colorful, talk a little like I did and just do half as much as I did for boxing, it will be all right.Collection: Boxing
What's really hurting me, the name Islam is involved, and Muslim is involved and causing trouble and starting hate and violence. ... Islam is not a killer religion. ... Islam means peace, I couldn't just sit home and watch people label Muslims as the reason for this problem.Collection: Hurt
I am the greatest. I said that even before I knew I was. Don't tell me I can't do something. Don't tell me it's impossible. Don't tell me I'm not the greatest. I'm the double greatest.Collection: Self Esteem
Our only hope lies in the power of our love, generosity, tolerance and understanding and our commitment to making the world a better place for all.Collection: Lying
I was the first one in the gym, and the last one to leave.Collection: Lasts
If Ali says a mosquito can pull a plow, don't ask how. Hitch him up.Collection: Boxing
I'm gonna have to be killed before I lose, and I ain't going to die easy.Collection: Boxing
All through my life, I have been tested. My will has been tested, my courage has been tested, my strength has been tested. Now my patience and endurance are being tested.Collection: Endurance
If the culprits are Muslim, they have twisted the teachings of Islam. Whoever performed, or is behind, the terrorist attacks in the United States of America does not represent Islam. God is not behind assassins.Collection: Powerful
I'm so mean I make medicine sick!Collection: Mean
Only last week I murdered a rock, injured a stone and hospitalized a brick.Collection: Rocks
You could be the world's best garbage man, the world's best model; it don't matter what you do if you're the best.Collection: Softball
Love is a net that catches hearts like a fishCollection: Love
The worst man is the one who sees himself as the best.Collection: Pride
Tolerance and understanding won't 'trickle down' in our society any more than wealth does.Collection: Justice
Home is the place you can go when you're whipped.Collection: Home
What I will remember most about Mr Mandela is that he was a man whose heart, soul and spirit could not be contained or restrained by racial and economic injustices, metal bars or the burden of hate and revenge.Collection: Revenge
I'm sure no intelligent white person, in his or her right white mind, want black men and women marrying their white sons and daughters and in return introducing their grandchildren to half brown, kinky haired black people.Collection: Daughter
I'm the king of the world, I am the greatest, I'm Muhammed Ali, I shook up the world, I am the greatest, I'm king of the world, I'm pretty, I'm pretty, I'm a baaaad man, you heard me I'm a baaad man, Archie Moore fell in four, Liston wanted me more, so since he's so great, I'm a make him fall in eight, I'm a baaad man, I'm king of the world! I'm 22 years old and ain't gotta mark on my face, I'm pretty, I easily survived six rounds with that ugly bear, because I am the greatest.Collection: Kings
Spirituality is recognizing the divine light that is within us all. It doesn't belong to any particular religion; it belongs to everyoneCollection: Light
The word had spread and people were piling around us. But then very suddenly, Sonny Liston froze me with that look of his. He said real quiet, 'Let's go on over here.' And he led the way to a table and the people hung back. I ain't going to lie. This was the only time since I have known Sonny Liston that he really scared me.Collection: Real
Many people are quick to say that we are not recognized by Muslims in the East . And I start with the Honorable Elijah Mohammed. In 1959, he went throughout the Holy City of Mecca to dine and wine with Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt and all of the black, mainly the rulers of the Islamic countries.Collection: Country
This boldness in telling the truth overshadows sport greatly. You couldn't get Joe Frazier or no boxer on this show and get interest in a subject like this. He couldn't talk about it.Collection: Sports
Emmett Till and I were about the same age. A week after he was murdered... I stood on a corner with a gang of boys, looking at pictures of him in the black newspapers and magazines. In one, he was laughing and happy. In the other, his head was swollen and bashed in, his eyes bulging out of their sockets, and his mouth twisted and broken... I couldn't get Emmett Till out of my mind, until one evening I thought of a way to get back at white people for his death.Collection: Eye
It's impossible for 30 million black people to be violent against 170 million - we need a mental revolution, unity in coming together, and not physical.Collection: People
Floyd Paterson? Boy, he's the complete opposite to me. He no way like me. They go down in history for just being athletes. I'm getting more praise and credit for doing what I'm doing now on this show than coming here and beating five of your English champions.Collection: Athlete
How come the Chinese can go where I can't go in America? Englishmen can come and set up a business in white America and do things I can't do.The Puerto Rican, Hawaiians, just about everybody can do more than black people and are more respected.Collection: White
I said I was the greatest, not the smartest.Collection: Boxing
I said a lot of things in the heat of the moment that I shouldn't have said. Called him names I shouldn't have called him. I apologise for that. I'm sorry. It was all meant to promote the fight.Collection: Sorry