God tries you in certain, certain ways. Some people are rich, and they believe in God. They lose the money, things get hard, they get weak and quit going to church. Quit serving God like they did.
There live a great man named Joe
who was belittled by a loudmouth foe.
While his rival would taunt and tease
Joe silently bore the stings.
And then fought like gladiator in the ring.
I did not take the name, I just named myself Cassius Clay, this is a honorable, Mohammed Ali, given to me by my religious leader and teacher, the Honorable Elijah Mohammed, and I would like to say that Mohammed means in Arabic "one who is worthy of praise" and one praiseworthy, and Ali means the most High, but the slave name Clay meant dirt with no ingredients.
I have the world heavyweight title not because it was 'given' to me, not because of my race or religion, but because I won it in the ring through my own boxing ability.
The fact is I never was too bright in school. I just barely graduated. I had a D- average. I ain't ashamed of it, though. I mean, how much do principals make a month?
Nobody has to tell me that this is a serious business. I'm not fighting one man. I'm fighting a lot of men, showing a lot of 'em, here is one man they couldn't defeat, couldn't conquer. My mission is to bring freedom to 30m black people
Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing
I would like to say boxing cannot compared with war. We have gloves on, we have cushions, we have referees, we have judges, we have ambulances there, the intention not to kill, we don't have steel there, we don't have bullets, we don't kill momma, kill daddy, kill baby, our intention is a sport, and we're not there to kill, so boxing cannot be compared in no way with machineguns and bombs and everything that used.
I'll tell you how I'd like to be remembered: As a black man who won the heavyweight title - Who has 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.