Nothing that God ever made is the same thing to more than one person. That is natural.

Meaning of the quote

Every person sees things differently. The same tree, flower, or cloud might look different to different people. That's just how it is. No two people will ever see the exact same thing in the same way, because each person is unique and has their own perspective.

About Zora Neale Hurston

Zora Neale Hurston was an acclaimed American writer, anthropologist, and folklorist who portrayed racial struggles in the early-20th-century American South. She is best known for her novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God” and her research on Hoodoo and Caribbean Vodou. Hurston’s works explored the African-American experience and her own struggles as a woman in a male-dominated field.

More about the author

More quotes from Zora Neale Hurston

Trees and plants always look like the people they live with, somehow.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

The present was an egg laid by the past that had the future inside its shell.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

I did not just fall in love. I made a parachute jump.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

When one is too old for love, one finds great comfort in good dinners.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

But for the national welfare, it is urgent to realize that the minorities do think, and think about something other than the race problem.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Anybody depending on somebody else’s gods is depending on a fox not to eat chickens.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

It’s a funny thing, the less people have to live for, the less nerve they have to risk losing nothing.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Ships at a distance have every man’s wish on board.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

No matter how far a person can go the horizon is still way beyond you.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

People can be slave-ships in shoes.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Grab the broom of anger and drive off the beast of fear.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

There are years that ask questions and years that answer.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

If you want that good feeling that comes from doing things for other folks then you have to pay for it in abuse and misunderstanding.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

It costs you something to do good!

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Gods always love the people who make em.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

It is one of the blessings of this world that few people see visions and dream dreams.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

It seems to me that trying to live without friends is like milking a bear to get cream for your morning coffee. It is a whole lot of trouble, and then not worth much after you get it.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

So the brother in black offers to these United States the source of courage that endures, and laughter.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

I do not weep at the world I am too busy sharpening my oyster knife.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

When a man keeps beating me to the draw mentally, he begins to get glamorous.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Gods always behave like the people who make them.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

A thing is mighty big when time and distance cannot shrink it.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

The Haitian people are gentle and lovable except for their enormous and unconscious cruelty.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Love, I find, is like singing. Everybody can do enough to satisfy themselves, though it may not impress the neighbors as being very much.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Those that don’t got it, can’t show it. Those that got it, can’t hide it.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

I regret all of my books.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

It was a weak spot in any nation to have a large body of disaffected people within its confusion.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

No man may make another free.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

I have been in Sorrow’s kitchen and licked out all the pots. Then I have stood on the peaky mountain wrapped in rainbows, with a harp and sword in my hands.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

There is something about poverty that smells like death.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Sometimes, I feel discriminated against, but it does not make me angry. It merely astonishes me. How can any deny themselves the pleasure of my company? It’s beyond me.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

It would be against all nature for all the Negroes to be either at the bottom, top, or in between. We will go where the internal drive carries us like everybody else. It is up to the individual.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Research is formalized curiosity. It is poking and prying with a purpose.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Mama exhorted her children at every opportunity to ‘jump at the sun.’ We might not land on the sun, but at least we would get off the ground.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

It seems that fighting is a game where everybody is the loser.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Love makes your soul crawl out from its hiding place.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

It’s no use of talking unless people understand what you say.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

The man who interprets Nature is always held in great honor.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Sweat, sweat, sweat! Work and sweat, cry and sweat, pray and sweat!

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)

Nothing that God ever made is the same thing to more than one person. That is natural.

Zora Neale Hurston

African American folklorist, novelist, short story writer, and Civic Rights advocate (1891-1960)