There isn’t anything noble about being superior to another person. True nobility is in being superior to the person you once were.

no man is superior, unless it was by merit, and no man is inferior, unless by his demerit.

Nothing is ever done beautifully which is done
in rival ship: or nobly, which is done in pride.

and I realized that real nobility is in the soul, not in a name.

No one can build his security upon the nobleness of another person.

The goal is not to be better than the other man, but your previous self.

The superior man has a dignified ease without pride. The mean man has pride without a dignified ease.

true excellence does not come from being superior to others, but means surpassing oneself time and again.

I am the inferior of any man whose rights I trample under foot. Men are not superior by reason of the accidents of race or color. They are superior who have the best heart — the best brain.

Ability without honor is useless.

A superior man in dealing with the world is not for anything or against anything. He follows righteousness as the standard.

Never contract friendship with a man that is not better than thyself.

One man is no more than another, if he do no more than what another does.

Wrong or right, he would never again for anything in the world have recourse to a priest. He admitted that these men were his superiors in intelligence or by reason of their sacred calling; but in argument there is neither superiority, nor inferiority, nor title, nor age, nor name; nothing is of worth but truth, before which all men are equal.