Martin Luther King, Jr. Quotes
-
If humanity is to progress, Gandhi is inescapable.
-
There is a type of constructive nonviolent tension that is necessary for growth.
-
Whatever affects one directly affects all indirectly.
-
We will never have peace in the world until men everywhere recognize that ends are not cut off from means, because the means represent the ideal in the making, and the end in process, and ultimately you can't reach good ends through evil means, because the means represent the seed and the end represents the tree.
-
Those who love peace must learn to organize as effectively as those who love war.
-
Agape means recognition of the fact that all life is interrelated. All humanity is involved in a single process, and all men are brothers. To the degree that I harm my brother, no matter what he is doing to me, to that extent I am harming myself.
-
Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.
-
So I have tried to make it clear that it is wrong to use immoral means to attain moral ends. But now I must affirm that it is just as wrong, or even more so, to use moral means to preserve immoral ends.
-
In the final analysis, means and ends must cohere because the end is preexistent in the means, and, ultimately, destructive means cannot bring about constructive ends.
-
Life's most persistent and urgent question is: what are you doing for others? Living is a form of not being sure, not knowing what next or how. The moment you know how, you begin to die a little.
-
Nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon. Indeed, it is a weapon unique in history, which cuts without wounding and ennobles the man who wields it.
-
We need not join the mad rush to purchase an earthly fallout shelter. God is our eternal fallout shelter. From Strength to Love, 1963
-
The potential beauty of human life is constantly made ugly by man's ever-recurring song of retaliation.
-
The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy.
-
True sympathy is the personal concern which demands the giving of one's soul.
-
If we do an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, we will be a blind and toothless nation.
-
I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits. I believe that what self-centered men have torn down men other-centered can build up. I still believe that one day mankind will bow before the altars of God and be crowned triumphant over war and bloodshed, and nonviolent redemptive good will proclaim the rule of the land.
-
We cannot be truly Christian people so long as we flaunt the central teachings of Jesus: brotherly love and the Golden Rule.
-
In this world is a God whose matchless strength is a fit contrast to the sordid weakness of man.
-
To deny a man a job is to say that a man has no right to exist.
-
I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial "outside agitator" idea.
-
What good is having the right to sit at a lunch counter if you can't afford to buy a hamburger?
-
Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge which is power; religion gives man wisdom which is control.
-
Not everybody can be famous but everybody can be great, because greatness is determined by service.