Quotes By Martin Luther King Jr.

I want to be the white man's brother, not his brother-in-law.

The art of acceptance is the art of making someone who has just done you a small favor wish that he might have done you a greater one.

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

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

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. 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.

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.

Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others?'

An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.

To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

I submit that an individual who breaks the law that conscience tells him is unjust and willingly accepts the penalty by staying in jail to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the very highest respect for law.

We are not makers of history. We are made by history.

I submit to you that if a man hasn't discovered something that he will die for, he isn't fit to live.

I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia, the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to sit together at the table of brotherhood.

One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society... shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam.

A right delayed is a right denied.

We must use time creatively.

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.

Pity may represent little more than the impersonal concern which prompts the mailing of a check, but true sympathy is the personal concern which demands the giving of one's soul.

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.

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

The question is not whether we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be... The nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.

The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood.

There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love.

Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal.

The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.

Law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress.

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made straight and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.

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

The Negro needs the white man to free him from his fears. The white man needs the Negro to free him from his guilt.