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Of Course, There Is Nothing New About This Kind Of Civil Disobedience. It Was Seen Sublimely In The Refusal Of Shadrach, Meshach And Abednego To Obey The Laws Of Nebuchadnezzar Because A Higher Moral Law Was Involved. It Was Practiced Superbly By The Early Christians Who Were Willing To Face Hungry Lions And The Excruciating Pain Of Chopping Blocks, Before Submitting To Certain Unjust Laws Of The Roman Empire.

-Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Of Course, There Is

Martin Luther King, Jr.

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Of Course, There Is Nothing New About This Kind Of Civil Disobedience. It Was Seen Sublimely In The Refusal Of Shadrach, Meshach And Abednego To Obey The Laws Of Nebuchadnezzar Because A Higher Moral Law Was Involved. It Was Practiced Superbly By The Early Christians Who Were Willing To Face Hungry Lions And The Excruciating Pain Of Chopping Blocks, Before Submitting To Certain Unjust Laws Of The Roman Empire.

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In This Revolution, No Plans Have Been Written For Retreat. Those Who Will Not Get Into Step Will Find That The Parade Has Passed Them By.

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.

The Moral Arc Of The Universe Bends At The Elbow Of Justice.

The Richer We Have Become Materially, The Poorer We Become Morally And Spiritually. We Have Learned To Fly In The Air Like Birds And Swim In The Sea Like Fish, But We Have Not Learned The Simple Art Of Living Together As Brothers.

It Is A Strangely Irrational Notion That There Is Something In The Very Flow Of Time That Will Inevitably Cure All Ills. Actually Time Is Neutral. It Can Be Used Either Destructively Or Constructively. I Am Coming To Feel That The People Of Ill Will Have Used Time Much More Effectively Than The People Of Good Will. We Will Have To Repent In This Generation Not Merely For The Vitriolic Words And Actions Of The Bad People, But For The Appalling Silence Of The Good People.

Nothing In The World Is More Dangerous Than Sincere Ignorance And Conscientious Stupidity.

Let Us Be Practical And Ask The Question: How Do We Love Our Enemies?

Love Your Enemies

"when I Speak Of Love I Am Not Speaking Of Some Sentimental And Weak Response. I Am Not Speaking Of That Force Which Is Just Emotional Bosh. I Am Speaking Of That Force Which All Of The Great Religions Have Seen As The Supreme Unifying Principle Of Life. Love Is Somehow The Key That Unlocks The Door Which Leads To Ultimate Reality."

There Is Nothing More Tragic Than To Find An Individual Bogged Down In The Length Of Life, Devoid Of Breadth.

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.

No Work Is Insignificant. All Labor That Uplifts Humanity Has Dignity

Dignity Of Work

The Christian Faith Makes It Possible For Us Nobly To Accept That Which Cannot Be Changed, And To Meet Disappointments And Sorrow With An Inner Poise, And To Absorb The Most Intense Pain Without Abandoning Our Sense Of Hope.

As Television Beamed The Image Of This Extraordinary Gathering Across The Border Oceans, Everyone Who Believed In Man's Capacity To Better Himself Had A Moment Of Inspiration And Confidence In The Future Of The Human Race.

You Can Kill The Dreamer, But You Can't Kill The Dream.

I'm Concerned About Justice. I'm Concerned About Brotherhood. I'm Concerned About Truth. And When One Is Concerned About These, He Can Never Advocate Violence.

Voting Is The Foundation Stone For Political Action.

The Surest Way To Be Happy Is To Seek Happiness For Others.

Sharing Happiness

Somebody Must Have Sense Enough And Morality Enough To Cut Off The Chain Of Hate And The Chain Of Evil In The Universe. And You Do That By Love

A Good Many Observers Have Remarked That If Equality Could Come At Once, The Negro Would Not Be Ready For It. I Submit That The White American Is Even More Unprepared.

Hate Is Just As Injurious To The Hater As It Is To The Hated. Like An Unchecked Cancer, Hate Corrodes The Personality And Eats Away Its Vital Unity. Many Of Our Inner Conflicts Are Rooted In Hate. This Is Why The Psychiatrists Say, "love Or Perish." Hate Is Too Great A Burden To Bear.

I've Decided To Stick With Love.

Was Not Jesus An Extremist For Love: "love Your Enemies, Bless Them That Curse You, Do Good To Them That Hate You, And Pray For Them Which Despitefully Use You, And Persecute You." Was Not Amos An Extremist For Justice: "let Justice Roll Down Like Waters And Righteousness Like An Ever-flowing Stream." Was Not Paul An Extremist For The Christian Gospel: "i Bear In My Body The Marks Of The Lord Jesus."

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Nonviolence Is Not Sterile Passivity, But A Powerful Moral Force Which Makes For Social Transformation.

Social Transformation

I May Not Be The Man I Want To Be; I May Not Be The Man I Ought To Be; I May Not Be The Man I Could Be; I May Not Be The Man I Truly Can Be; But Praise God, I'm Not The Man I Once Was

Individuals May See The Moral Light And Voluntarily Give Up Their Unjust Posture; But, As Reinhold Niebuhr Has Reminded Us, Groups Are More Immoral Than Individuals.

Power At Its Best Is Love Implementing The Demand Of Justice.

[e]very Human Life Is A Reflection Of Divinity, And... Every Act Of Injustice Mars And Defaces The Image Of God In Man.

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We Are Challenged To Develop A World Perspective. No Individual Can Live Alone, No Nation Can Live Alone, And Anyone Who Feels That He Can Live Alone Is Sleeping Through A Revolution. The World In Which We Live Is Geographically One.

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The Negro Is The Child Of Two Cultures - Africa And America. The Problem Is That In The Search For Wholeness All Too Many Negroes Seek To Embrace Only One Side Of Their Natures.

Never Could I Advocate Nonviolence In This Country And Not Advocate Nonviolence For The Whole World.

A Second Way That Oppressed People Sometimes Deal With Oppression Is To Resort To Physical Violence And Corroding Hatred.

Unearned Suffering Is Redemptive.

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Pursuit Of Happiness

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If You Can't Be A Sun, Be A Star. For It Isn't By Size That You Win Or Fail. Be The Best Of Whatever You Are.

We All Can't Be Famous But We Can All Be Great And We Become Great When We Serve Others

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We Have A Great Dream. It Started Way Back In 1776, And God Grant That America Will Be True To Her Dream.

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We Cannot Walk Alone.

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If A Man Is Called To Be A Street Sweeper, He Should Sweep Streets Even As A Michaelangelo Painted, Or Beethoven Composed Music Or Shakespeare Wrote Poetry. He Should Sweep Streets So Well That All The Hosts Of Heaven And Earth Will Pause To Say, 'here Lived A Great Street Sweeper Who Did His Job Well.

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Violence Ends Up Defeating Itself. It Creates Bitterness In The Survivors And Brutality In The Destroyers.

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And When This Happens, When We Allow Freedom Ring, When We Let It Ring From Every Village And Every Hamlet, From Every State And Every City, We Will Be Able To Speed Up That Day When All Of God's Children, Black Men And White Men, Jews And Gentiles, Protestants And Catholics, Will Be Able To Join Hands And Sing In The Words Of The Old Negro Spiritual: Free At Last! Free At Last! Thank God Almighty, We Are Free At Last!

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All Life Is Interrelated. The Agony Of The Poor Impoverishes The Rich; The Betterment Of The Poor Enriches The Rich. We Are Inevitably Our Brother's Keeper Because We Are Our Brother's Brother. Whatever Affects One Directly Affects All Indirectly.

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What Is More Tragic Than To See A Person Who Has Risen To The Disciplined Heights Of Tough-mindedness But Has At The Same Time Sunk To The Passionless Depths Of Hard-heartedness?

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Look To A Day When People Will Not Be Judged By The Color Of Their Skin.

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.

I Must Face The Fact, As All Others In Positions Of Leadership Must Do, That America Today Is An Extremely Sick Nation, And That Something Could Well Happen To Me At Any Time. I Feel, Though, That My Cause Is So Right, So Moral, That If I Should Lose My Life, In Some Way It Would Aid The Cause.

When We Look At Modern Man, We Have To Face The Fact...that Modern Man Suffers From A Kind Of Poverty Of The Spirit, Which Stands In Glaring Contrast To His Scientific And Technological Abundance; We've Learned To Fly The Air Like Birds, We've Learned To Swim The Seas Like Fish, And Yet We Haven't Learned To Walk The Earth As Brothers And Sisters.

One Who Breaks An Unjust Law That Conscience Tells Him Is Unjust ... Is In Reality Expressing The Highest Respect For Law ... We Will Not Obey Your Evil Laws.

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The Nation Is Sick; Trouble Is In The Land, Confusion All Around...but I Know, Somehow, That Only When It Is Dark Enough Can You See The Stars. And I See God Working In This Period Of The Twentieth Century. Something Is Happening In Our World. The Masses Of People Are Rising Up. And Wherever They Are Assembled Today, Whether They Are In Johannesburg, South Africa; Nairobi, Kenya; Accra, Ghana; New York City; Atlanta, Georgia; Jackson, Mississippi; Or Memphis, Tennessee, The Cry Is Always The Same: 'we Want To Be Free.'

The Greatest Purveyor Of Violence In The World : My Own Government, I Can Not Be Silent.

Before It Is Too Late, We Must Narrow The Gaping Chasm Between Our Proclomations Of Peace And Our Lowly Deeds Which Precipitate And Perpetuate War.

In The Final Analysis The Weakness Of Black Power Is Its Failure To See That The Black Man Needs The White Man And The White Man Needs The Black Man.

Education Must Enable A Man To Become More Efficient, To Achieve With Increasing Facility The Legitimate Goals Of His Life.

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.

Human Progress Never Rolls In On The Wheels Of Inevitability; It Comes Through The Tireless Efforts And The Persistent Work Of Dedicated Individuals Who Are Willing To Be Co-workers With God And Without This Hard Work Time Itself Becomes An Ally Of The Primitive Forces Of Social Stagnation.

Alienation Is A Form Of Living Death. It Is The Acid Of Despair That Dissolves Society.

Only In The Darkness Can You See The Stars.

Hate Begets Hate; Violence Begets Violence; Toughness Begets A Greater Toughness. We Must Meet The Forces Of Hate With The Power Of Love.

History Will Have To Record That The Greatest Tragedy Of This Period Of Social Transition Was Not The Strident Clamor Of The Bad People, But The Appalling Silence Of The Good People.

Bad Relationship

Man Must Never Be Treated As A Means To The End Of The State, But Always As An End Within Himself.

The Road To Freedom Is A Difficult, Hard Road. It Always Makes For Temporary Setbacks.

Temporary Setbacks

It's Very Easy For One Talking About Violence And Hatred For The White Man To Appeal To [negro From Ghetto]. I Have Never Thought Of This, But I Think This Is Quite True, That If, Even If You Talk To Them About Nonviolence From A Tactical Point Of View, They Can't Quite See It Because They Don't Even Know They're Outnumbered.

A Time Comes When Silence Is Betrayal. That Time Has Come For Us In Relation To Vietnam. A Nation That Continues Year After Year To Spend More Money On Military Defense Than On Programs Of Social Uplift, Is Approaching Spiritual Death.i Knew That America Would Never Invest The Necessary Funds Or Energies In Rehabilitation Of Its Poor So Long As Adventures Like Vietnam Continued To Draw Men And Skills And Money Like Some Demonic Destructive Suction Tube. So I Was Increasingly Compelled To See The War As An Enemy Of The Poor.

If You Will Protest Courageously, And Yet With Dignity And Christian Love, When The History Books Are Written In Future Generations, The Historians Will Have To Pause And Say, "there Lived A Great People-a Black People-who Injected New Meaning And Dignity Into The Veins Of Civilization.

I Said To My Children, 'i'm Going To Work And Do Everything That I Can Do To See That You Get A Good Education. I Don't Ever Want You To Forget That There Are Millions Of God's Children Who Will Not And Cannot Get A Good Education, And I Don't Want You Feeling That You Are Better Than They Are. For You Will Never Be What You Ought To Be Until They Are What They Ought To Be.

Let Us Say Boldly, That If The Total Slum Violations Of Law By The White Man Over The Years Were Calculated And Compared With The Lawbreaking Of A Few Days Of Riots, The Hardened Criminal Would Be The White Man.

When Evil Men Plot, Good Men Must Plan. When Evil Men Burn And Bomb, Good Men Must Build And Bind. When Evil Men Shout Ugly Words Of Hatred, Good Men Must Commit Themselves To The Glories Of Love.

If Our Economic System Is To Survive, There Has To Be A Better Distribution Of Wealth ... We Can't Have A System Where Some People Live In Superfluous, Inordinate Wealth, While Others Live In Abject Deadening Poverty.

Distribution Of Wealth

You See, My Friends...you Begin To Ask The Questions, 'who Owns The Oil?' You Begin To Ask The Question, 'who Owns The Iron Ore?' You Begin To Ask The Question, 'why Is It That People Have To Pay Water Bills In A World That Is Two-thirds Water?'

There's Another Reason Why You Should Love Your Enemies, And That Is Because Hate Distorts The Personality Of The Hater. We Usually Think Of What Hate Does For The Individual Hated Or The Individuals Hated Or The Groups Hated. But It Is Even More Tragic, It Is Even More Ruinous And Injurious To The Individual Who Hates. [...] For The Person Who Hates, The True Becomes False And The False Becomes True. That's What Hate Does.

We Have Genuflected Before The God Of Science Only To Find That It Has Given Us The Atomic Bomb, Producing Fears And Anxieties That Science Can Never Mitigate.

Babies, We Are Told, Are The Latest News From Heaven.

A Lie Cannot Live.

Even In The Inevitable Moments When All Seems Hopeless, Men Know That Without Hope They Cannot Really Live, And In Agonizing Desperation They Cry For The Bread Of Hope.

In A World Facing The Revolt Of Ragged And Hungry Masses Of God's Children; In A World Torn Between The Tensions Of East And West, White And Colored, Individuals And Collectivists; In A World Whose Cultural And Spiritual Power Lags So Far Behind Her Technological Capabilities That We Live Each Day On The Verge Of Nuclear Co-annihilation; In This World, Nonviolence Is No Longer An Option For Intellectual Analysis, It Is An Imperative For Action

If Your Opponent Has A Conscience, Then Follow Gandhi And Nonviolence. But If Your Enemy Has No Conscience Like Hitler, Then Follow Bonhoeffer.

We Refuse To Believe That The Bank Of Justice Is Bankrupt.

I Have A Dream Speech

A Just Law Is A Man-made Code That Squares With The Moral Law, Or The Law Of God. An Unjust Law Is A Code That Is Out Of Harmony With The Moral Law.

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.

If The Church Of Today Does Not Recapture The Sacrificial Spirit Of The Early Church, It Will Lose Its Authentic Ring, Forfeit The Loyalty Of Millions, And Be Dismissed As An Irrelevant Social Club With No Meaning For The Twentieth Century.

There Is Nothing In All The World Greater Than Freedom. It Is Worth Paying For; It Is Worth Going To Jail For. I Would Rather Be A Free Pauper Than A Rich Slave. I Would Rather Die In Abject Poverty With My Convictions Than Live In Inordinate Riches With The Lack Of Self Respect.

One Day The South Will Know That When These Disinherited Children Of God Sat Down At Lunch Counters, They Were In Reality Standing Up For What Is Best In The American Dream And For The Most Sacred Values In Our Judaeo-christian Heritage, Thereby Bringing Our Nation Back To Those Great Wells Of Democracy Which Were Dug Deep By The Founding Fathers In Their Formulation Of The Constitution And The Declaration Of Independence.

The Saving Of Our World From Pending Doom Will Come, Not Through The Complacent Adjustment Of The Conforming Majority, But Through The Creative Maladjustment Of A Nonconforming Minority.

One Day We Will Learn That The Heart Can Never Be Totally Right If The Head Is Totally Wrong. Only Through The Bringing Together Of Head And Heart-intelligence And Goodness-shall Man Rise To A Fulfillment Of His True Nature.

If You Want To Move People, It Has To Be Toward A Vision That's Positive For Them, That Taps Important Values, That Gets Them Something They Desire And It Has To Be Presented In A Compelling Way So That They Feel Inspired To Follow.

Important Values

The Government Can't Make People Love Me, But It Can Keep Them From Lynching Me.

Brutality Was Imprisoned In A Lumious Glare Revealing The Naked Truth To The Whole World

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.

The Negro Cannot Win The Respect Of His Oppressor By Acquiescing; He Merely Increases The Oppressor's Arrogance And Contempt.

To Put It In The Terms Of St. Thomas Aquinas: An Unjust Law Is A Human Law That Is Not Rooted In Eternal Law And Natural Law.

When We Ask Negroes To Abide By The Law, Let Us Also Declare That The White Man Does Not Abide By Law In The Ghettos. Day In And Day Out He Violates Welfare Laws To Deprive The Poor Of Their Meager Allotments; He Flagrantly Violates Building Codes And Regulations; His Police Make A Mockery Of Law; He Violates Laws On Equal Employment And Education And The Provisions Of Civil Services. The Slums Are The Handiwork Of A Vicious System Of The White Society; Negroes Live In Them, But They Do Not Make Them, Any More Than A Prisoner Makes A Prison.

Change Does Not Roll In On The Wheels Of Inevitability, But Comes Through Continuous Struggle. And So We Must Straighten Our Backs And Work For Our Freedom. A Man Can't Ride You Unless Your Back Is Bent.

Violence Multiplies Violence.

I Had A Very Depressing Response Because I Realized That These Were My Own People, These Were Negroes Throwing Eggs At Me. I'm Concerned About The Fact That Maybe All Of Us Have Contributed To This By Not Working Harder To Get Rid Of The Conditions, The Poverty, The Social Isolation, And All Of The Conditions That Cause Individuals To Respond Like This.

Through Our Scientific And Technological Genius We've Made Of This World A Neighborhood. And Now Through Our Moral And Ethical Commitment We Must Make Of It A Brotherhood. We Must All Learn To Live Together As Brothers-or We Will All Perish Together As Fools.

It May Be True That The Law Cannot Make A Man Love Me, But It Can Keep Him From Lynching Me, And I Think That's Pretty Important.

Of All The Forms Of Inequality, Injustice In Health Care Is The Most Shocking And Inhumane.

The Strong Man Holds In A Living Blend Strongly Marked Opposites.

A Religion True To Its Nature Must Also Be Concerned About Man's Social Conditions....a Ny Religion That Professes To Be Concerned With The Souls Of Men And Is Not Concerned With The Slums That Damn Them, The Economic Conditions That Strangle Them, And The Social Conditions That Cripple Them Is A Dry-as-dust Religion.

The Church Must Be The Critic And Guide Of The State, And Never Its Tool.

Now A Lot Of Us Are Preachers, And All Of Us Have Our Moral Convictions And Concerns, And So Often Have Problems With Power. There Is Nothing Wrong With Power If Power Is Used Correctly.

I Never Cease To Wonder At The Amazing Presumption Of Much Of White Society, Assuming That They Have The Right To Bargain With The Negro For His Freedom.

It Is Not A Sign Of Weakness, But A Sign Of High Maturity, To Rise To The Level Of Self-criticism.

Gandhi Was Inevitable. If Humanity Is To Progress, Gandhi Is Inescapable. He Lived, Thought And Acted, Inspired By The Vision Of Humanity Evolving Toward A World Of Peace And Harmony. We May Ignore Gandhi At Our Own Risk.

Education Without Social Action Is A One-sided Value Because It Has No True Power Potential.

Will We Be Extremists For Hate, Or Will We Be Extremists For Love? Will We Be Extremists For The Preservation Of Injustice, Or Will We Be Extremists For The Cause Of Justice?

There Is No Truth To The Myth That Negroes Depreciate Property. The Fact Is That Most Negroes Are Kept Out Of Residential Neighborhoods So Long That When One Of Us Is Finally Sold A Home, It's Already Depreciated.

This Faith Transforms The Whirlwind Of Despair Into A Warm And Reviving Breeze Of Hope. The Words Of A Motto Which A Generation Ago Were Commonly Found On The Wall In The Homes Of Devout Persons Need To Be Etched On Our Hearts: Fear Knocked At The Door. Faith Answered. There Was No One There.

This Revolution Is Genuine Because It Was Born From The Same Womb That Always Gives Birth To Massive Social Upheavals - The Womb Of Intolerable Conditions And Unendurable Situations.

We Must Remember That Intelligence Is Not Enough. Intelligence Plus Character-that Is The Goal Of True Education. The Complete Education Gives One Not Only Power Of Concentration, But Worthy Objectives Upon Which To Concentrate.

Liberalism Provided Me With An Intellectual Satisfaction That I Never Found In Fundamentalism. I Became So Enamored Of The Insights Of Liberalism That I Almost Fell Into The Trap Of Accepting Uncritically Everything It Encompassed.

One Day We Shall Win Freedom, But Not Only For Ourselves. We Shall So Appeal To Your Heart And Conscience That We Shall Win You In The Process, And Our Victory Will Be A Double Victory.

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.

We Must Combine The Toughness Of The Serpent With The Softness Of The Dove, A Tough Mind And A Tender Heart.

The Ultimate Measure Of A Man Is Not Where He Stands In Moments Of Comfort And Convenience, But Where He Stands In Times Of Challenge And Controversy. The True Neighbor Will Risk His Position, His Prestige, And Even His Life For The Welfare Of Others. In Dangerous Valleys And Hazardous Pathways, He Will Lift Some Bruised And Beaten Brother To A Higher And More Noble Life.

We Are Now Faced With The Fact That Tomorrow Is Today. We Are Confronted With The Fierce Urgency Of Now. In This Unfolding Conundrum Of Life And History, There "is" Such A Thing As Being Too Late. This Is No Time For Apathy Or Complacency. This Is A Time For Vigorous And Postive Action.

I May Not Get There With You, But I Believe That We As A People Will Someday Reach The Promised Land.

We Cannot Walk Alone. And As We Walk, We Must Make The Pledge That We Shall Always March Ahead. We Cannot Turn Back.

I Have A Dream Speech

Without Denying The Value Of Scientific Endeavor, There Is A Striking Absurdity In Committing Billions To Reach The Moon Where No People Live, While Only A Fraction Of That Amount Is Appropriated To Service The Densely Populated Slums.

What The Negro Wants - And Will Not Stop Until He Gets - Is Absolute And Unqualified Freedom And Equality Here In This Land Of His Birth, And Not In Africa Or In Some Imaginary State. The Negro No Longer Will Be Tolerant Of Anything Less Than His Due Right And Heritage. He Is Pursuing Only That Which He Knows Is Honorably His. He Knows That He Is Right.

Curtailment Of Free Speech Is Rationalized On Grounds That A More Compelling American Tradition Forbids Criticism Of The Government When The Nation Is At War... Nothing Can Be More Destructive Of Our Fundamental Democratic Traditions Than The Vicious Effort To Silence Dissenters.

Everybody Can Be Great, Because Everybody Can Serve. [...] You Only Need A Heart Full Of Grace.

Too Often An Institution Serves To Bless The Majority Opinion. Today When Too Many Move To The Rhythmic Beat Of The Status Quo, Whoever Would Be A Christian Must Be A Nonconformist.

It Is Not Possible To Be In Favor Of Justice For Some People And Not Be In Favor Of Justice For All People.

Justice For All

The Function Of Education Is To Teach One To Think Intensively And To Think Critically. Intelligence Plus Character - That Is The Goal Of True Education.

When The Negro Was Completely An Underdog, He Needed White Spokesmen. Liberals Played Their Parts In This Period Exceedingly Well.... But Now That The Negro Has Rejected His Role As An Underdog, He Has Become More Assertive In His Search For Identity And Group Solidarity; He Wants To Speak For Himself.

The More I Thought About Human Nature, The More I Saw How Our Tragic Inclination For Sin/mistakes Causes Us To Use Our Minds To Rationalize Our Action.

We've Learned To Fly The Air Like Birds, We've Learned To Swim The Seas Like Fish, And Yet We Haven't Learned To Walk The Earth As Brothers And Sisters

I Say To You Today, My Friends, So Even Though We Face The Difficulties Of Today And Tomorrow, I Still Have A Dream.

Injustice Anywhere Threatens Justice Everywhere.

Injustice Anywhere

Hatred Paralyzes Life; Love Releases It. Hatred Confuses Life; Love Harmonizes It. Hatred Darkens Life; Love Illuminates It.

And When You Discover What You Will Be In Your Life, Set Out To Do It As If God Almighty Called You At This Particular Moment In History To Do It. Don't Just Set Out To Do A Good Job.

We Must Work Passionately And Indefatigably To Bridge The Gulf Between Our Scientific Progress And Our Moral Progress. One Of The Great Problems Of Mankind Is That We Suffer From A Poverty Of The Spirit Which Stands In Glaring Contrast To Our Scientific And Technological Abundance. The Richer We Have Become Materially, The Poorer We Have Become Morally And Spiritually.

Religion Operates Not Only On The Vertical Plane But Also On The Horizontal. It Seeks Not Only To Integrate Men With God But To Integrate Men With Men And Each Man With Himself.

The Truth May Hurt, But Love Helps Ease The Pain.

We Have No Alternative But To Protest. For Many Years We Have Shown An Amazing Patience... But We Come Here Tonight To Be Saved From That Patience That Makes Us Patient With Anything Less Than Freedom And Justice.

Science Investigates, Religion Interprets. Science Gives Man Knowledge Which Is Power, Religion Gives Man Wisdom Which Is Control. Science Deals Mainly With Facts, Religion Deals With Values. The Two Are Not Rivals. They Are Complementary.

I Have Almost Reached The Regrettable Conclusion That The Negro's Great Stumbling Block In The Stride Toward Freedom Is Not The White Citizens Councilor Or The Ku Klux Klanner But The White Moderate Who Is More Devoted To Order Than To Justice; Who Prefers A Negative Peace Which Is The Absence Of Tension To A Positive Peace Which Is The Presence Of Justice.

The Most Dangerous Criminal May Be The Man Gifted With Reason, But With No Morals.

Our Problem Is Not To Be Rid Of Fear But Rather To Harness And Master It.

My Country, 'tis Of Thee, Sweet Land Of Liberty, Of Thee I Sing. Land Where My Fathers Died, Land Of The Pilgrim's Pride, From Every Mountainside, Let Freedom Ring.

A True Revolution Of Values Will Soon Cause Us To Question The Fairness And Justice Of Many Of Our Present Policies... True Compassion Is More Than Flinging A Coin To A Beggar. A True Revolution Of Values Will Soon Look On Uneasily Upon The Glaring Contrast Of Poverty And Wealth With Righteous Indignation.

Nonviolence Is The Answer To The Crucial Political Moral Questions Of Our Time.

Foundation Of Love

The Majority Of The Negroes Who Took Part In The Year-long Boycott Of Montgomery's Buses Were Poor And Untutored; But They Understood The Essence Of The Montgomery Movement; One Elderly Woman Summed It Up For The Rest. When Asked After Several Weeks Of Walking Whether She Was Tired, She Answered: "my Feet Is Tired, But My Soul Is At Rest.

If You Lose Hope, Somehow You Lose The Vitality That Keeps Moving, You Lose That Courage To Be, That Quality That Helps You Go On In Spite Of It All. And So Today I Still Have A Dream.

Oh, The Worst Of All Tragedies Is Not To Die Young, But To Live Until I Am Seventy Five And Yet Not Ever Truly To Have Lived.

There Is Nothing More Dangerous Than To Build A Society With A Large Segment Of People In That Society Who Feel That They Have No Stake In It; Who Feel That That Have Nothing To Lose. People Who Have Stake In Their Society, Protect That Society, But When They Don't Have It, They Unconsciously Want To Destroy It.

Nothing To Lose

The 'tide In The Affairs Of Men' Does Not Remain At The Flood; It Ebbs. We May Cry Out Desperately For Time To Pause In Her Passage, But Time Is Deaf To Every Plea And Rushes On. Over The Bleached Bones And Jumbled Residue Of Numerous Civilizations Are Written The Pathetic Words: 'too Late...'

There Is Nothing But A Lack Of Social Vision To Prevent Us From Paying An Adequate Wage To Every American Citizen Whether He Be A Hospital Worker, Laundry Worker, Maid Or Day Laborer

I Think There Can Be A Collective Leadership. Maybe Some Symbolize The Struggle [for Human's Rights] A Little More Than Others, But I Think It's Absolutely Necessary For The Leadership To Be United In Order To Make The Revolution Effective.

If Humanity Is To Progress, Gandhi Is Inescapable.

I've Seen Too Much Hate To Want To Hate, Myself.

The Old Law Of An Eye For An Eye Leaves Everyone Blind. It Destroys Communities And Makes Humanity Impossible. It Creates Bitterness In The Survivors And Brutality In The Destroyers... In Winning Our Freedom, We Will So Appeal To You Heart And Conscience That We Will Win You In The Process.

Make No Mistake About Those Who Call Themselves Anti Zionist Are Anti Semitic.

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.

Five Score Years Ago, A Great American, In Whose Symbolic Shadow We Stand Today Signed The Emancipation Proclamation. This Momentous Decree Came As A Great Beacon Light Of Hope To Millions Of Negro Slaves Who Had Been Seared In The Flames Of Withering Injustice. It Came As A Joyous Daybreak To End The Long Night Of Their Captivity. But One Hundred Years Later, We Must Face The Tragic Fact That The Negro Is Still Not Free.

The Method Of Nonviolence Seeks Not To Humiliate And Not To Defeat The Oppressor, But It Seeks To Win His Friendship And His Understanding. And Thereby And Therefore The Aftermath Of This Method Is Reconciliation.

Human Salvation Lies In The Hands Of The Creatively Maladjusted.

The Marvelous New Militancy Which Has Engulfed The Negro Community Must Not Lead Us To A Distrust Of All White People, For Many Of Our White Brothers, As Evidenced By Their Presence Here Today, Have Come To Realize That Their Destiny Is Tied Up With Our Destiny And Their Freedom Is Inextricably Bound To Our Freedom.

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.

Violence Brings Only Temporary Victories; Violence, By Creating Many More Social Problems Than It Solves, Never Brings Permanent Peace.

I'm Grateful To God That, Through The Negro Church, The Dimension Of Nonviolence Entered Our Struggle.

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