Like all my family and class, I considered it a sign of weakness to show affection to have been caught kissing my mother would have been a disgrace, and to have shown affection for my father would have been a disaster. – Agnes Smedley
Much that we read of Russia is imagination and desire only. – Agnes Smedley
And the woman who could win the respect of man was often the woman who could knock him down with her bare fists and sit on him until he yelled for help. – Agnes Smedley
Now, being a girl, I was ashamed of my body and my lack of strength. So I tried to be a man. I shot, rode, jumped, and took part in all the fights of the boys. – Agnes Smedley
Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites…
Society cannot exist, unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere; and the less of it there is within, the more there must be without. – Edmund Burke