Top 70 Haile Selassie Quotes (2025 Update)

1. “There is no power or authority without responsibility, and he who accepts the one cannot escape or evade the other.”

— Haile Selassie

Featured in: Accountability Quotes

2. “You must always remember that to lead, one must first learn to follow...”

— Haile Selassie

3. “Throughout history, it has been the inaction of those who could have acted; the indifference of those who should have known better; the silence of the voice of justice when it mattered most; that has made it possible for evil to triumph.”

— Haile Selassie

4. “A house built on granite and strong foundations, not even the onslaught of pouring rain, gushing torrents and strong winds will be able to pull down.”

— Haile Selassie

5. “We should accept diversity in culture and tradition and coexist peacefully...”

— Haile Selassie

6. “A well organized education should not be one which prepares students for a good remuneration alone. It should be one that can help and guide them towards acquiring clear thinking, a fruitful mind, and an elevated spirit.”

— Haile Selassie

7. “It is important that spiritual advancement must keep pace with material advancement...”

— Haile Selassie

8. “Do not worship me, I am not God. I’m only a man. I worship Jesus Christ.”

— Haile Selassie

9. “Knowledge is power. If it is not applied properly to create, let there be no doubts, it will destroy.”

— Haile Selassie

10. “Imagination, devotion, perseverance, together with divine grace, will assure your success.”

— Haile Selassie

11. “Leadership does not mean domination. The world is always well supplied with people who wish to rule and dominate others.”

— Haile Selassie

12. “If you are open-minded and ready to learn, there are many things which you can learn not only from books and instructores but form the very life experience itself.”

— Haile Selassie

13. “Place principle above all else.”

— Haile Selassie

14. “Man cannot live by bread alone. Man after all is composed of intellect and soul.”

— Haile Selassie

15. “There is always something moving, brewing. There are ambitious people everywhere. Wicked people. The only thing to do is to deal with them with courage and decision. One must beware of uncertainty, weakness or conflicting emotions – they lead to defeat.”

— Haile Selassie

16. “The fruits of one’s sweat and mental labour are always rewarding.”

— Haile Selassie

17. “Feel the needs of others more than your own.”

— Haile Selassie

18. “Democracy, Republic: What do these words signify? What have they changed in the world? Have men become better, more loyal, kinder? Are the people happier? All goes on as before, as always. Illusions, illusions.”

— Haile Selassie

19. “Leadership does not mean domination.”

— Haile Selassie

20. “It is both the duty and responsibility of the world’s fortunate few to help fulfil the legitimate aspirations of the unfortunate many.”

— Haile Selassie

21. “Knowledge paves the way to Love, and Love in its turn fosters understanding, and leads one along the path of great common achievements.”

— Haile Selassie

22. “History teaches us that unity is strength, and cautions us to submerge and overcome our differences in the quest for common goals, to strive, with all our combined strength, for the path to true African brotherhood and unity.”

— Haile Selassie

23. “A man who says “I have learned enough and will learn no further” should be considered as knowing nothing at all.”

— Haile Selassie

24. “Many discouraging hours will arise before the rainbow of accomplished goals will appear on the horizon.”

— Haile Selassie

25. “We must make progress slowly so as to preserve the progress we have already made.”

— Haile Selassie

26. “Any who may wish to profit himself alone from the knowledge given him, rather than serve others through the knowledge he has gained from learning, is betraying knowledge and rendering it worthless.”

— Haile Selassie

27. “Spiritual power is the eternal guide, in this life and the life after, for man ranks supreme among all creatures. Led forward by spiritual power, man can reach the summit destined for him by the Great Creator.”

— Haile Selassie

28. “It is much easier to show compassion to animals. They are never wicked.”

— Haile Selassie

29. “Outside the kingdom of the Lord there is no nation which is greater than any other. God and history will remember your judgment.”

— Haile Selassie

30. “A well informed public opinion is essential to the growth of political and social awareness. Only he who is informed can comment intelligently on his nation’s development and only by such comments can errors be corrected and progress stimulated.”

— Haile Selassie

31. “We must become bigger than we have been: more courageous, greater in spirit, larger in outlook. We must become members of a new race, overcoming petty prejudice, owing our ultimate allegiance not to nations but to our fellow men within the human community.”

— Haile Selassie

32. “Peace demands the united efforts of us all. Who can foresee what spark might ignite the fuse?”

— Haile Selassie

33. “The true leader is a different sort; he seeks effective activity which has a truly beneficient purpose. He inspires others to follow in his wake, and holding aloft the torch of wisdom, leads the way for society to realize its genuinely great aspirations.”

— Haile Selassie

34. “There is no safer anchorage for our learning, our lives, and our public actions than that provided by Divine teachings...”

— Haile Selassie

35. “No one should question the faith of others, for no human being can judge the ways of God.”

— Haile Selassie

36. “Every labourer is a father, his labour is his child. Choose your project carefully and achieve it worthily.”

— Haile Selassie

37. “Let us set our goals too high; let us demand more of ourselves than we believe we possess.”

— Haile Selassie

38. “There is nothing as precious to man as a sound mind in a sound body and it is essential that the physical well being of our people merits as much attention as its spiritual welfare.”

— Haile Selassie

39. “We have finished the job, what shall we do with the tools?”

— Haile Selassie

40. “Peace is a day-to-day problem, the product of a multitude of events and judgments. Peace is not an ‘is,’ it is a ‘becoming.’”

— Haile Selassie

41. “If a strong government finds that it can, with impunity, destroy a weak people, then the hour has struck for that weak people to appeal to the League of Nations to give its judgment in all freedom. God and history will remember your judgment.”

— Haile Selassie

42. “We must act to shape and mold the future, and leave our imprint on events as they slip past into history.”

— Haile Selassie

43. “An awareness of our past is essential to the establishment of our personality and our identity as Africans.”

— Haile Selassie

44. “We all wish to live. We all seek a world in which men are freed of the burdens of ignorance, poverty, hunger and disease. And we shall all be hard-pressed to escape the deadly rain of nuclear fall-out should catastrophe overtake us.”

— Haile Selassie

45. “Education develops the intellect; and the intellect distinguishes man from other creatures. It is education that enables man to harness nature and utilize her resources for the well-being and improvement of his life.”

— Haile Selassie

46. “It is not only war that can stop war but men of goodwill, conscious of their mission can deal with such deadly enemy...”

— Haile Selassie

47. “Everyone, in all walks of life, regardless of his professional occupation should feel concerned and play an active role to solve such problems which affect mankind...”

— Haile Selassie

48. “As man’s faculty attains higher level of development and sophistication, so do his wants in life.”

— Haile Selassie

49. “Thousands of years ago, civilizations flourished in Africa which suffer not at all by comparison with those of other continents. In those centuries, Africans were politically free and economically independent. Their social patterns were their own and their cultures truly indigenous.”

— Haile Selassie

50. “Unity should be the cornerstone of relations.”

— Haile Selassie