I hope that you are learning, day by day, that all kinds of labour--whether with the mind or with the hand--are honourable, and that people only disgrace themselves by being and keeping in idleness.
Washington advocates for the honor of all forms of labor and the importance of avoiding idleness.
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More from Booker T. Washington
Ever since I have been old enough to think for myself, I have entertained the idea that, notwithstanding the cruel wrongs inflicted upon us, the black man got nearly as much out of slavery as the white man did.
I have long since ceased to cherish any spirit of bitterness against the Southern white people on account of the enslavement of my race.
Even the most ignorant members of my race on the remote plantations felt in their hearts, with a certainty that admitted of no doubt, that the freedom of the slaves would be the one great result of the war, if the Northern armies conquered.
The whole machinery of slavery was so constructed as to cause labour, as a rule, to be looked upon as a badge of degradation, of inferiority.