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MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR. QUOTES III

We come humbly to say to the men in the forefront of our government that the civil rights issue is not an Ephemeral, evanescent domestic issue that can be kicked about by reactionary guardians of the status quo; it is rather an eternal moral issue which may well determine the destiny of our nation in the ideological struggle with communism. The hour is late. The clock of destiny is ticking out. We must act now, before it is too late.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., speech delivered at the Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom in Washington, D.C., 1957

The labor movement was the principal force that transformed misery and despair into hope and progress. Out of its bold struggles, economic and social reform gave birth to unemployment insurance, old-age pensions, government relief for the destitute and, above all, new wage levels that meant not mere survival but a tolerable life. The captains of industry did not lead this transformation; they resisted it until they were overcome. When in the thirties the wave of union organization crested over the nation, it carried to secure shores not only itself but the whole society.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., speech to the state convention of the Illinois AFL-CIO, Oct. 7, 1965

In spite of temporary victories, violence never brings permanent peace. It solves no social problem; it merely creates new and more complicated ones.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Stride Toward Freedom

Most people can't stand up for their convictions, because the majority of people might not be doing it. See, everybody's not doing it, so it must be wrong. And since everybody is doing it, it must be right. So a sort of numerical interpretation of what's right.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., sermon delivered at Detroit's Second Baptist Church, Feb. 28, 1954

It's wrong to hate. It always has been wrong and it always will be wrong. It's wrong in America, it's wrong in Germany, it's wrong in Russia, it's wrong in China. It was wrong in 2000 B.C., and it's wrong in 1954 A.D. It always has been wrong, and it always will be wrong.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., sermon delivered at Detroit's Second Baptist Church, Feb. 28, 1954

It is a trite yet urgently true observation that if America is to remain a first-class nation, it cannot have second-class citizens.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Address at the Golden Anniversary Conference of the National Urban League, Sep. 6, 1960

The question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love?

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., "Letter from a Birmingham Jail," 1963

The labor movement did not diminish the strength of the nation but enlarged it. By raising the living standards of millions, labor miraculously created a market for industry and lifted the whole nation to undreamed of levels of production. Those who attack labor forget these simple truths, but history remembers them.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., speech to AFL-CIO on Dec. 11, 1961

Man is man because he is free to operate within the framework of his destiny. He is free to deliberate, to make decisions, and to choose between alternatives. He is distinguished from animals by his freedom to do evil or to do good and to walk the high road of beauty or tread the low road of ugly degeneracy.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., The Measures of Man

It is true that behavior cannot be legislated, and legislation cannot make you love me, but legislation can restrain you from lynching me, and I think that is kind of important.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., speech at Finney Chapel at Oberlin College, Oct. 22, 1964

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.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Strength to Love

Hate at any point is a cancer that gnaws away at the very vital center of your life and your existence. It is like eroding acid that eats away the best and the objective center of your life.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, Nov. 17, 1957

Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social stagnation.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., "Letter from a Birmingham Jail," 1963

Forgiveness does not mean ignoring what has been done or putting a false label on an evil act. It means, rather, that the evil act no longer remains as a barrier to the relationship. Forgiveness is a catalyst creating the atmosphere necessary for a fresh start and a new beginning.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Christmas sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, 1957

The war in Vietnam is but a symptom of a far deeper malady within the American spirit.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., speech at Riverside Church in New York City, "A Time to Break Silence", April 4, 1967

When the opportunity presents itself for you to defeat your enemy, that is the time which you must not do it. There will come a time, in many instances, when the person who hates you most, the person who has misused you most, the person who has gossiped about you most, the person who has spread false rumors about you most, there will come a time when you will have an opportunity to defeat that person. It might be in terms of a recommendation for a job; it might be in terms of helping that person to make some move in life. That’s the time you must do it. That is the meaning of love. In the final analysis, love is not this sentimental something that we talk about. It’s not merely an emotional something. Love is creative, understanding goodwill for all men. It is the refusal to defeat any individual. When you rise to the level of love, of its great beauty and power, you seek only to defeat evil systems. Individuals who happen to be caught up in that system, you love, but you seek to defeat the system.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, Nov. 17, 1957

Jesus is eternally right. History is replete with the bleached bones of nations that refused to listen to him.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Christmas sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, 1957

It is love that will save our world and our civilization, love even for enemies.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, Nov. 17, 1957

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.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Christmas sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, 1957

The most dangerous type of atheism is not theoretical atheism, but practical atheism —that's the most dangerous type. And the world, even the church, is filled up with people who pay lip service to God and not life service. And there is always a danger that we will make it appear externally that we believe in God when internally we don't. We say with our mouths that we believe in him, but we live with our lives like he never existed. That is the ever-present danger confronting religion. That's a dangerous type of atheism.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., sermon delivered at Detroit's Second Baptist Church, Feb. 28, 1954

God is not interested merely in freeing black men and brown men and yellow men, but God is interested in freeing the whole human race. We must work with determination to create a society, not where black men are superior and other men are inferior and vice versa, but a society in which all men will live together as brothers and respect the dignity and worth of human personality.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., speech delivered at the Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom in Washington, D.C., 1957

Oh America, how often have you taken necessities from the masses to give luxuries to the classes. If you are to be a truly Christian nation you must solve this problem. You cannot solve the problem by turning to communism, for communism is based on an ethical relativism and a metaphysical materialism that no Christian can accept. You can work within the framework of democracy to bring about a better distribution of wealth. You can use your powerful economic resources to wipe poverty from the face of the earth. God never intended for one group of people to live in superfluous inordinate wealth, while others live in abject deadening poverty. God intends for all of his children to have the basic necessities of life

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., sermon delivered at Dexter Avenue Baptist Church in Montgomery, Alabama, Nov. 4, 1956

Over the past two years, as I have moved to break the betrayal of my own silences and to speak from the burnings of my own heart, as I have called for radical departures from the destruction of Vietnam, many persons have questioned me about the wisdom of my path. At the heart of their concerns this query has often loomed large and loud: "Why are you speaking about the war, Dr. King?" "Why are you joining the voices of dissent?" "Peace and civil rights don't mix," they say. "Aren't you hurting the cause of your people," they ask? And when I hear them, though I often understand the source of their concern, I am nevertheless greatly saddened, for such questions mean that the inquirers have not really known me, my commitment or my calling. Indeed, their questions suggest that they do not know the world in which they live.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., speech at Riverside Church in New York City, "A Time to Break Silence", April 4, 1967

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., "Where do we go from here: Chaos or Community?", 1967

If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. And if we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a utopian dreamer that never came down to Earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie, love has no meaning. And we are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until "justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream."

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Address to the first Montgomery Improvement Association Mass Meeting, at Holt Street Baptist Church, December 5, 1955

Love has within it a redemptive power. And there is a power there that eventually transforms individuals. Just keep being friendly to that person. Just keep loving them, and they can't stand it too long.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., A Knock at Midnight: Inspiration from the Great Sermons of Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr.

Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., MLK, Jr. Quotes: The Vision of Martin Luther King, Jr.

It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that's pretty important.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., attributed, King: Pilgrimage to the Mountaintop

Personality is like a charioteer with two headstrong horses, each wanting to go in different directions.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Loving Your Enemies, November 1957

To other countries, I may go as a tourist, but to India, I come as a pilgrim.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., The Papers of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Our world hinges on moral foundations. God has made it so. God has made the universe to be based on a moral law. So long as man disobeys it he is revolting against God. That's what we need in the world today: people who will stand for right and goodness. It's not enough to know the intricacies of zoology and biology, but we must know the intricacies of law. It is not enough to know that two and two makes four, but we've got to know somehow that it's right to be honest and just with our brothers. It's not enough to know all about our philosophical and mathematical disciplines, but we've got to know the simple disciplines of being honest and loving and just with all humanity. If we don't learn it, we will destroy ourselves by the misuse of our own powers.

MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., sermon delivered at Detroit's Second Baptist Church, February 28, 1954

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