Authors
Topics
Lists
Pictures
Resources
More about Martin Luther King
Martin Luther King, Jr. Quotes
618 Sourced Quotes
Source
Report...
I experience this high and joyous moment not for myself alone but for those devotees of nonviolence who have moved so courageously against the ramparts of racial injustice and who in the process have acquired a new estimate of their own human worth. Many of them are young and cultured. Others are middle aged and middle class. The majority are poor and untutored. But they are all united in the quiet conviction that it is better to suffer in dignity than to accept segregation in humiliation. These are the real heroes of the freedom struggle: they are the noble people for whom I accept the Nobel Peace Prize.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Agape is something of the understanding, creative, redemptive goodwill for all men. It is a love that seeks nothing in return. It is an overflowing love; it's what theologians would call the love of God working in the lives of men. And when you rise to love on this level, you begin to love men, not because they are likeable, but because God loves them.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists, who are dedicated to justice, peace, and brotherhood. The trailblazers in human, academic, scientific, and religious freedom have always been nonconformists. In any cause that concerns the progress of mankind, put your faith in the nonconformist!
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Our problem is not to be rid of fear but rather to harness and master it.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
A great nation is a compassionate nation. Who are the least of these? The least of these are those who still find themselves smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in an affluent society. Who are the least of these? They are the thousands of individuals who see life as a long and desolate corridor with no exit sign. Who are the least of these? They are the little boys and little girls who grow up with clouds of inferiority floating in their little mental skies because they know that they are caught in conditions of economic depravation. Who are the least of these? They are the individuals who are caught in the fatigue of despair. And somehow if we are to be a great nation, we must be concerned about the least of these, our brothers.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
The principle of nonviolent resistance seeks to reconcile the truths of two opposites-Acquiescence and violence -while avoiding the extremes and immoralities of both.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
How long? Not long, because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
We believe firmly in the revelation of God in Jesus Christ. I can see no conflict between our devotion to Jesus Christ and our present action. In fact, I can see a necessary relationship. If one is truly devoted to the religion of Jesus he will seek to rid the earth of social evils. The gospel is social as well as personal.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
We aren't engaged in any negative protest and in any negative arguments with anybody. We are saying that we are determined to be men. We are determined to be people. We are saying that we are God's children. And that we don't have to live like we are forced to live.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Far from being the pious injunction of a utopian dreamer, this command is an absolute necessity for the survival of our civilization. Yes, it is love that will save our world and our civilization, love even for enemies.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
I could never adjust to the separate waiting rooms, separate eating places, separate rest rooms, partly because the separate was always unequal, and partly because the very idea of separation did something to my sense of dignity and self-respect.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
If I sought to answer all of the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would be engaged in little else in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Just as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, so must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to majestic heights of understanding and brotherhood.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Your ultimate allegiance is not to the government, not to the state, not to nation, not to any man-made institution. The Christian owes his ultimate allegiance to God, and if any earthly institution conflicts with God's will it is your Christian duty to take a stand against it. You must never allow the transitory evanescent demands of man-made institutions to take precedence over the eternal demands of the Almighty God.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
The Declaration of Independence proclaimed to a world, organized politically and spiritually around the concept of the inequality of man, that the dignity of human personality was inherent in man as a living being. The Emancipation Proclamation was the offspring of the Declaration of Independence. It was a constructive use of the force of law to uproot a social order which sought to separate liberty from a segment of humanity.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Communism forgets that life is individual. Capitalism forgets that life is social, and the kingdom of brotherhood is found neither in the thesis of communism nor the antithesis of capitalism but in a higher synthesis. It is found in a higher synthesis that combines the truths of both. Now, when I say question the whole society, it means ultimately coming to see that the problem of racism, the problem of exploitation, and the problem of war are all tied together. These are the triple evils that are interrelated.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Another reason that I'm happy to live in this period is that we have been forced to a point where we're going to have to grapple with the problems that men have been trying to grapple with through history, but the demands didn't force them to do it. Survival demands that we grapple with them. Men, for years now, have been talking about war and peace. But now, no longer can they just talk about it. It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world; it's nonviolence or nonexistence.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
I refuse to accept despair as the final response to the ambiguities of history. I refuse to accept the idea that the "isness" of man's present nature makes him morally incapable of reaching up for the eternal "oughtness" that forever confronts him
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Freedom only comes through persistent revolt, through persistent agitation, through persistently rising up against the system of evil.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
I do think there must be centralized leadership in the sense that, say, in our struggle all of the leaders coordinate their efforts, cooperate and, and at least evince a degree of unity.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Jesus reminds us that the good life combines the toughness of the serpent and the tenderness of the dove. To have serpent-like qualities devoid of dovelike qualities is to be passionless, mean, and selfish. To have dovelike without serpent-like qualities is to be sentimental, anemic and aimless. We must combine strongly marked antitheses.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Will we march only to the music of time, or will we, risking criticism and abuse, march to the soul-saving music of eternity?
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Nonviolence demands that the means we use must be as pure as the ends we seek.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Source
Report...
Millions of citizens are deeply disturbed that the military-industrial complex too often shapes national policy, but they do not want to be considered unpatriotic.
Martin Luther King, Jr.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
...
25
Quote of the day
Life is not having been told that the man has just waxed the floor.
Ogden Nash
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Creative Commons
Born:
January 15, 1929
Died:
April 4, 1968
(aged 39)
Bio:
Martin Luther King Jr. was an American Baptist minister and activist who was a leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement.
Known for:
I Have a Dream (1963)
The Autobiography Of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Why We Can't Wait (1964)
Strength to Love (1963)
Most used words:
love
god
man
life
people
freedom
hate
nation
justice
white
violence
power
law
live
negro
Martin Luther King on Wikipedia
Martin Luther King works on Wikisource
Suggest an edit or a new quote
Martin Luther King Quotes
Martin Luther King Short Quotes
Quotes about Martin Luther King
American Activist Quotes
Activist Quotes
20th-century Activist Quotes
Related People
Malcolm X
American Activist
Mahatma Gandhi
Indian Politician
Rosa Parks
American Activist
Nelson Mandela
South African President
Family
Coretta Scott King
Spouse
Yolanda King
Daughter
Martin Luther King III
Son
Dexter Scott King
Son
Bernice King
Daughter
Featured Authors
Lists
Predictions that didn't happen
If it's on the Internet it must be true
Remarkable Last Words (or Near-Last Words)
Picture Quotes
Confucius
Philip James Bailey
Eleanor Roosevelt
Letitia Elizabeth Landon
Popular Topics
life
love
nature
time
god
power
human
mind
work
art
heart
thought
men
day
×
Lib Quotes