Martin Luther King Jr.
1929-1968

“The moral arc of the universe bends at the elbow of justice.”

“We are reaching out for the daybreak of freedom and justice and equality.”

“The real problem is that through our scientific genius we've made of the world a neighborhood, but through our moral and spiritual genius we've failed to make of it a brotherhood...We cannot solve this problem through retaliatory violence.”

“An Individual has not started living fully until they can rise above the narrow confines of individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of humanity. And this is one of the big problems of life, that so many people never quite get to the point of rising above self. And so they end up the tragic victims of self-centeredness. They end up the victims of distorted and disrupted personality. ...These are the people who cannot face disappointments. These are the people who cannot face being defeated. These are the people who cannot face being criticized. These are the people who cannot face these many experiences of life which inevitably come because they are too centered in themselves. ...Every person must decide at some point, whether they will walk in light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness. This is the judgment: Life's most persistent and urgent question is: 'What are you doing for others?'”

“Justice is love correcting that which revolts against love...True peace is the presence of justice.”

“But I'm here to say to you this morning that some things are right and some things are wrong. Eternally so, absolutely so. It's wrong to hate. It always has been wrong and it always will be wrong.”

“Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.”

“A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan.”

“Our aim is to persuade. We adopt the means of non-violence because our end is a community at peace with itself.”

“We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war but the postive affirmation of peace.”

“Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.”

“The means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek.”

“Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.”

“Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which we arrive at that goal.”

“I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear.”

“Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.”

“We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love.”

“The chain reaction of evil--hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars--must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.”

“Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.”

“Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend. We never get rid of an enemy by meeting hate with hate; we get rid of an enemy by getting rid of enmity.”

“There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.”

“Through words he gave voice to the voiceless. Through deeds he gave courage to the faint of heart.”
~ Barack Obama

“Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable... Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.”

“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”

“A man dies when he refuses to stand up for that which is right. A man dies when he refuses to stand up for justice. A man dies when he refuses to take a stand for that which is true.”

“He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against it is really cooperating with it.”

“Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”

“I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality... I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.”

“We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”

“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”

“When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.”

“We who engage in nonviolent direct action are not the creators of tension. We merely bring to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive.”

“Any religion that professes to be concerned about the souls of men and is not concerned about the slums that damn them, the economic conditions that strangle them and the social conditions that cripple them is a spiritually moribund religion awaiting burial.”

“Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself.”

“A lie cannot live.”

“I am not interested in power for power's sake, but I'm interested in power that is moral, that is right and that is good.”

“I just want to do God's will. And he's allowed me to go to the mountain. And I've looked over, and I've seen the promised land! I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land.”

“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.”

“All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.”

“Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality.”

“Call it democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better distribution of wealth within this country for all God's children.”

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

“It's all right to tell a man to lift himself by his own bootstraps, but it is cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps.”

“I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.”

“We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people but for the appalling silence of the good people.”

“Was not Jesus an extremist for love...”

“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.”

“Ultimately a genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus, but a molder of consensus.”

View "I Have A Dream" Speech 17:27