Background Image

...

Somebody Told A Lie One Day. They Couched It In Language. They Made Everything Black Ugly And Evil. Look In Your Dictionaries And See The Synonyms Of The Word Black. It's Always Something Degrading And Low And Sinister. Look At The Word White, It's Always Something Pure, High And Clean.

-Martin Luther King, Jr.

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

Somebody Told A Lie

Martin Luther King, Jr.

...

Somebody Told A Lie One Day. They Couched It In Language. They Made Everything Black Ugly And Evil. Look In Your Dictionaries And See The Synonyms Of The Word Black. It's Always Something Degrading And Low And Sinister. Look At The Word White, It's Always Something Pure, High And Clean.

Views: 9

Topic

More From Martin Luther King, Jr.

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.

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

We Need Not Join The Mad Rush To Purchase An Earthly Fallout Shelter. God Is Our Eternal Fallout Shelter. From Strength To Love, 1963

A Law Is Unjust If It Is Inflicted On A Minority That, As A Result Of Being Denied The Right To Vote, Had No Part In Enacting Or Devising The Law. Who Can Say That The Legislature Of Alabama Which Set Up The State's Segregation Laws Was Democratically Elected?

Unity Has Never Meant Uniformity.

I Think That My Strong Determination For Justice Comes From The Very Strong, Dynamic Personality Of My Father ... I Have Rarely Ever Met A Person More Fearless And Courageous Than My Father ... The Thing That I Admire Most About My Dad Is His Genuine Christian Character. He Is A Man Of Real Integrity, Deeply Committed To Moral And Ethical Principles. He Is Conscientious In All Of His Undertakings ... If I Had A Problem I Could Always Call Daddy.

A Time Comes When Silence Is Betrayal.

We Are Not Makers Of History. We Are Made By History.

I Have Decided To Stick With Love. Hate Is Too Great A Burden To Bear.

It's Not How Long A Man Lives, But How Well He Uses The Time Allotted Him.

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!

Today, Our Very Survival Depends On Our Ability To Stay Awake, To Adjust To New Ideas, To Remain Vigilant And To Face The Challenge Of Change.

A Riot Is The Language Of The Unheard.

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 Have Condemned Any Organizer Of War, Regardless Of His Rank Or Nationality.

Courage Faces Fear And Thereby Masters It

It Is Better To Be The Recipient Of Violence Than The Inflicter Of It, Since The Latter Only Multiplies The Existence Of Violence And Bitterness In The Universe, While The Former May Develop A Sense Of Shame In The Opponent, And Thereby Bring About A Transformation And Change Of Heart.

If We Do An Eye For An Eye And A Tooth For A Tooth, We Will Be A Blind And Toothless Nation.

He (jesus) Knew That The Old Eye-for-eye Philosophy Would Leave Everyone Blind. He Did Not Seek To Overcome Evil With Evil. He Overcame Evil With Good. Although Crucified By Hate, He Responded With Aggressive Love.

Another Reason Why We Must Love Our Enemies Is That Hate Scars The Soul And Distorts The Personality.

But There Is Another Way. And That Is To Organize Mass Non-violent Resistance Based On The Principle Of Love. It Seems To Me That This Is The Only Way As Our Eyes Look To The Future. As We Look Out Across The Years And Across The Generations, Let Us Develop And Move Right Here. We Must Discover The Power Of Love, The Power, The Redemptive Power Of Love. And When We Discover That We Will Be Able To Make Of This Old World A New World. We Will Be Able To Make Men Better. Love Is The Only Way.

Non-violent Direct Action Seeks To Create Such A Crisis And Establish Such Creative Tension That A Community That Has Constantly Refused To Negotiate Is Forced To Confront The Issue. It Seeks So To Dramatize The Issue That It Can No Longer Be Ignored... I Am Not Afraid Of The Word Tension. I Have Earnestly Worked And Preached Against Violent Tension, And There Is A Type Of Constructive Tension That Is Necessary For Growth.

I Am Disappointed With America. And There Can Be No Great Disappointment Where There Is Not Great Love. I Am Disappointed With Our Failure To Deal Positively And Forthrightly With The Triple Evils Of Racism, Economic Exploitation, And Militarism. We Are Presently Moving Down A Dead-end Road That Can Lead To National Disaster. America Has Strayed To The Far Country Of Racism And Militarism.

We Can Dream Of An America, And A World, In Which Love And Not Money Are Civilization's Bottom Line.

As The Weeks And Months Unfolded, We Realized That We Were The Victims Of A Broken Promise.

This Is The Unusual Thing About Nonviolence -- Nobody Is Defeated, Everybody Shares In The Victory.

I Became Convinced That Noncooperation With Evil Is As Much A Moral Obligation As Is Cooperation With Good. No Other Person Has Been More Eloquent And Passionate In Getting This Idea Across Than Henry David Thoreau. As A Result Of His Writings And Personal Witness, We Are The Heirs Of A Legacy Of Creative Protest.

There Is A Magnificent New Militancy Within The Negro Community All Across This Nation. And I Welcome This As A Marvelous Development. The Negro Of America Is Saying He's Determined To Be Free And He Is Militant Enough To Stand Up.

I Feel That Non-violence Is Really The Only Way That We Can Follow Because Violence Is Just So Self-defeating. A Riot Ends Up Creating Many More Problems For The Negro Community Than It Solved. We Can Through Violence Burn Down A Building, But You Can't Establish Justice. You Can Murder A Murderer, But You Can't Murder Murder Through Violence. You Can Murder A Hater, But You Can't Murder Hate. And What We're Trying To Get Rid Of Is Hate, Injustice, And All Of These Other Things That Continue The Long Night Of Man's Inhumanity To Man.

If A Person Sweeps Streets For A Living, He Should Sweep Them As Michelangelo Painted, As Beethoven Composed, As Shakespear Wrote.

Be An Artist At Whatever You Do. Even If You Are A Street Sweeper, Be The Michelangelo Of Street Sweepers.

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

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.

When You Cut Facilities, Slash Jobs, Abuse Power, Discriminate, Drive People Into Deeper Poverty & Shoot People Dead Whilst Refusing To Provide Answers Or Justice, The People Will Rise Up & Express Their Anger & Frustration If You Refuse To Hear Their Cries. A Riot Is The Language Of The Unheard.

We Have Deluded Ourselves Into Believing The Myth That Capitalism Grew And Prospered Out Of The Protestant Ethic Of Hard Work And Sacrifices. Capitalism Was Built On The Exploitation Of Black Slaves And Continues To Thrive On The Exploitation Of The Poor, Both Black And White, Both Here And Abroad.

Black And White

Power Properly Understood Is Nothing But The Ability To Achieve Purpose. It Is The Strength Required To Bring About Social, Political And Economic Change.

Love Is Basic For The Very Survival Of Mankind. I'm Convinced That Love Is The Only Absolute Ultimately; Love Is The Highest Good. He Who Loves Has Somehow Discovered The Meaning Of Ultimate Reality. He Who Hates Does Not Know God; He Who Hates Has No Knowledge Of God. Love Is The Supreme Unifying Principle Of Life.

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

Returning Hate For Hate Multiplies Hate.

Loving Your Enemies

The Great Military Leaders Of The Past Have Gone, Their Empires Have Crumbled And Burned To Ashes. But The Empire Of Jesus, Built Solidly And Majestically On The Foundation Of Love, Is Still Growing.

I Don't Think You Can Be In Public Life Without Being Called Bad Names.

Only In The Darkness Can You See The Stars.

Any Nation Or Government That Deprives An Individual Of Freedom Is In That Moment Committing An Act Of Moral And Spiritual Murder. Any Individual Who Is Not Concerned About His Freedom Commits An Act Of Moral And Spiritual Suicide.

I Could Never Again Raise My Voice Against The Violence Of The Oppressed, Without Having First Spoken Clearly To The Greatest Purveyor Of Violence In The World Today – My Own Government.

Even If I Were Certain That The World Would End Tomorrow, I Would Plant A Tree This Very Day

There Is Little Hope For Us Until We Become Tough-minded Enough To Break Loose From The Shackles Of Prejudice, Half-truths, And Down-right Ignorance.

It Is Not Only Poverty That Torments The Negro; It Is The Fact Of Poverty Amid Plenty. It Is A Misery Generated By The Gulf Between The Affluence He Sees In The Mass Media And The Deprivation He Experiences In His Everyday Life.

But Though I Was Initially Disappointed At Being Categorized As An Extremist, As I Continued To Think About The Matter I Gradually Gained A Measure Of Satisfaction From The Label. 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.”

There Are Always Those Who Say Legislation Can't Solve The Problem. There Is A Half-truth Involved Here. It Is True That Legislation Cannot Solve The Whole Problem. It Can Solve Some Of The Problem. It May Be True That Morality Can't Be Legislated, But Behavior Can Be Regulated.

The Thing That We Need In The World Today, Is A Group Of Men And Women Who Will Stand Up For Right And Be Opposed To Wrong, Wherever It Is. A Group Of People Who Have Come To See That Some Things Are Wrong, Whether They’re Never Caught Up With. Some Things Are Right, Whether Nobody Sees You Doing Them Or Not.

This Will Be The Day When We Shall Bring Into Full Realization The Dream Of American Democracy - A Dream Yet Unfulfilled. A Dream Of Equality Of Opportunity, Of Privilege And Property Widely Distributed; A Dream Of A Land Where Men Will Not Take Necessities From The Many To Give Luxuries To The Few.

We Are Called Upon To Help The Discouraged Beggars In Life's Marketplace. But One Day We Must Come To See That An Edifice Which Produces Beggars Needs Restructuring.

The Labor Movement Was The Principal Force That Transformed Misery And Despair Into Hope And Progress.

We Can No Longer Afford To Worship The God Of Hate Or Bow Before The Altar Of Retaliation. The Oceans Of History Are Made Turbulent By The Ever-rising Tides Of Hate. History Is Cluttered With The Wreckage Of Nations And Individuals That Pursued This Self-defeating Path Of Hate. Love Is The Key To The Solution Of The Problems Of The World.

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.

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.

Today We Know With Certainty That Segregation Is Dead. The Only Question Remaining Is How Costly Will Be The Funeral.

There Is Nothing More Tragic In All The World Than To Know Right And Not To Do It.

We Have Also Come To This Hallowed Spot To Remind America Of The Fierce Urgency Of Now. This Is No Time To Engage In The Luxury Of Cooling Off Or To Take The Tranquilizing Drug Of Gradualism. Now Is The Time To Make Real The Promises Of Democracy

A Second Basic Fact That Characterizes Nonviolence Is That It Does Not Seek To Defeat Or Humiliate The Opponent, But To Win His Friendship And Understanding.

Beloved Community

A Man Does Not Measure Its Height In Moments Of Comfort, But In Terms Of Change And Controversy

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?

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.

A Right Delayed Is A Right Denied.

No One Really Knows Why They Are Alive Until They Know What They'd Die For.

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.

Right Defeated Is Stronger Than Evil Triumphant.

Unconditional Love

People Are Often Led To Causes And Often Become Committed To Great Ideas Through Persons Who Personify Those Ideas. They Have To Find The Embodiment Of The Idea In Flesh And Blood In Order To Commit Themselves To It.

If You Can’t Run, Walk; If You Can’t Walk, Crawl, But Keep Moving Forward!

On Some Positions, Cowardice Asks The Question, Is It Expedient? And Then Expedience Comes Along And Asks The Question, Is It Politic? Vanity Asks The Question, Is It Popular? Conscience Asks The Question, Is It Right? There Comes A Time When One Must Take The Position That Is Neither Safe Nor Politic Nor Popular, But He Must Do It Because Conscience Tells Him It Is Right.

As We Have Seen, The First Public Expression Of Disenchantment With Nonviolence Arose Around The Question Of 'self-defense.' In A Sense This Is A False Issue, For The Right To Defend One's Home And One's Person When Attacked Has Been Guaranteed Through The Ages By Common Law.

Our Lives Are Not Fully Lived If We're Not Willing To Die For Those We Love, For What We Believe.

Hate Is Too Heavy A Burden To Bear.

A Church That Has Lost Its Voice For Justice Is A Church That Has Lost Its Relevance In The World.

Hate Destroys The Hater.

I Refuse To Accept The Idea That Man Is Mere Flotsam And Jetsam In The River Of Life, Unable To Influence The Unfolding Events Which Surround Him.

The Non-violent Resistor Not Only Avoids External, Physical Violence, But He Avoids Internal Violence Of Spirit. He Not Only Refuses To Shoot His Opponent, But He Refuses To Hate Him. And He Stands With Understanding, Goodwill At All Times.

Injustice Anywhere Is A Threat To Justice Everywhere. We Are Caught In An Inescapable Network Of Mutuality, Tied In A Single Garment Of Destiny.

Nonviolence Is A Powerful And Just Weapon. Which Cuts Without Wounding And Ennobles The Man Who Wields It. It Is A Sword That Heals.

I Just Want To Leave A Committed Life Behind.

The Body Is God's Temple, But We Are To Worship God, Not The Temple.

I Still Have A Dream Today That One Day War Will Come To An End, That Men Will Beat Their Swords Into Plowshares And Their Spears Into Pruning Hooks, That Nations Will No Longer Rise Up Against Nations, Neither Will They Study War Any More.

Difficult And Painful As It Is, We Must Walk On In The Days Ahead With An Audacious Faith In The Future.

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.

We Must Follow Nonviolence And Love.

I Want To Suggest Some Of The Things That Should Begin Your Life's Blueprint. Number One...should Be A Deep Belief In Your Own Dignity. Your Worth And Your Own Somebodiness... Always Feel That You Count. Always Feel That You Have Worth, And Always Feel That Your Life Has Ultimate Significance.

Violence Multiplies Violence.

We Are Prone To Judge Success By The Index Of Our Salaries Or The Size Of Our Automobiles Rather Than By The Quality Of Our Service And Relationship To Mankind.

We Have Flown The Air Like Birds And Swum The Sea Like Fishes, But Have Yet To Learn The Simple Act Of Walking The Earth Like Brothers.

I Oppose The War In Vietnam Because I Love America. I Speak Out Against It Not In Anger But With Anxiety And Sorrow In My Heart, And Above All With A Passionate Desire To See Our Beloved Country Stand As A Moral Example Of The World.

I Have An Ultimate Faith In America And An Audacious Faith In Mankind.

To Deny A Man A Job Is To Say That A Man Has No Right To Exist.

Our Only Hope Today Lies In Our Ability To Recapture The Revolutionary Spirit And Go Out Into A Sometimes Hostile World Declaring Eternal Hostility To Poverty, Racism, And Militarism... We Are Now Faced With The Fact, My Friends, That Tomorrow Is Today. We Are Confronted With The Fierce Urgency Of Now.

Don't Let Anybody Take Your Manhood.

Even If They Try To Kill You, You Develop The Inner Conviction That There Are Some Things So Precious, Some Things So Eternally True That They Are Worth Dying For. And If A Person Has Not Found Something To Die For, That Person Isn't Fit To Live!

I Decide On The Basis Of Conscience. A Genuine Leader Doesn't Reflect Consensus, He Molds Consensus.

It's Not The Violence Of The Few That Scares Me, It's The Silence Of The Many

Many White Americans Of Good Will Have Never Connected Bigotry With Economic Exploitation. They Have Deplored Prejudice But Tolerated Or Ignored Economic Injustice.

Many Of The Ugly Pages Of American History Have Been Obscured And Forgotten. A Society Is Always Eager To Cover Misdeeds With A Cloak Of Forgetfulness, But No Society Can Fully Repress An Ugly Past When The Ravages Persist Into The Present. America Owes A Debt Of Justice Which It Has Only Begun To Pay. If It Loses The Will To Finish Or Slackens In Its Determination, History Will Recall Its Crimes And The Country That Would Be Great Will Lack The Most Indispensable Element Of Greatness — Justice.

We've Got Some Difficult Days Ahead. But It Doesn't Matter With Me Now. Because I've Been To The Mountaintop. And I Don't Mind. Like Anybody, I Would Like To Live A Long Life. Longevity Has Its Place. But I'm Not Concerned About That Now. I Just Want To Do God's Will. And He's Allowed Me To Go Up To The Mountaintop. And I've Looked Over. And I've Seen The Promised Land.

The White Poor Also Suffer Deprivation And The Humiliation Of Poverty If Not Of Color. They Are Chained By The Weight Of Discrimination Though Its Badge Of Degradation Does Not Mark Them. It Corrupts Their Lives, Frustrates Their Opportunities And Withers Their Education. In One Sense It Is More Evil For Them Because It Has Confused So Many By Prejudice That They Have Supported Their Own Oppressors.

Be Sure To Play "blessed Lord" Tonight - Play It Real Pretty.

A Nation Or Civilization That Continues To Produce Soft-minded Men Purchases Its Own Spiritual Death On The Installment Plan.

Courage Is The Power Of The Mind To Overcome Fear.

Perhaps The Worst Sin In Life Is Knowing Right And Not Doing It.

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.

I'm Thinking Of Love In Action And Not Something Where You Say, "love Your Enemies," And Just Leave It At That, But You Love Your Enemies To The Point That You're Willing To Sit-in At A Lunch Counter In Order To Help Them Find Themselves. You're Willing To Go To Jail.

Discrimination Is A Hellhound That Gnaws At Negroes In Every Waking Moment Of Their Lives To Remind Them That The Lie Of Their Inferiority Is Accepted As Truth In The Society Dominating Them.

The Day We See The Truth And Cease To Speak Is The Day We Begin To Die

Though We Live In The Colony Of Time, We Are Ultimately Responsible To The Empire Of Eternity.

The Hope Of The World Is Still In Dedicated Minorities. The Trail-blazers In Human, Scientific And Religious Freedom Have Always Been In A Minority.

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.

I" Cannot Reach Fulfillment Without "thou." The Self Cannot Be Self Without Other Selves. Self-concern Without Other-concern Is Like A Tributary That Has No Outward Flow To The Ocean.

It Is Incontestable And Deplorable That Negroes Have Committed Crimes; But They Are Derivative Crimes. They Are Born Of The Greater Crimes Of The White Society.

I Am Convinced That Love Is The Most Durable Power In The World. It Is Not An Expression Of Impractical Idealism, But Of Practical Realism.

We Can Walk Through The Darkest Night With The Radiant Conviction That All Things Work Together For The Good.

Working Together

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.

Every Person Must Stand Up And Be Accountable, But Be Responsible For Their Actions.

Being Responsible

Even Though I Have Never Had An Abrupt Conversion Experience, Religion Has Been Real To Me And Closely Knitted To Life. In Fact The Two Cannot Be Separated; Religion For Me Is Life.

Time Has Been Used Destructively By People Of Ill Will Much More Than It Has Been Used Constructively By Those Of Good Will.

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...'

The Time Is Always Right To Do What Is Right.

The Ultimate Weakness Of Violence Is That It Is A Descending Spiral, Begetting The Very Thing It Seeks To Destroy.

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

Nothing Pains Some People More Than Having To Think

Those Of Us Who Love Peace Must Organize As Effectively As The War Hawks. As They Spread The Propaganda Of War, We Must Spread The Propaganda Of Peace.

Truth Is Found Neither In Marxism Nor In Traditional Capitalism. Each Represents A Partial Truth. Historically Capitalism Failed To See The Truth In Collective Enterprise, And Marxism Failed To See The Truth In Individual Enterprise. Nineteenth Century Capitalism Failed To See That Life Is Social And Marxism Failed And Still Fails To See That Life Is Individual And Personal. The Kingdom Of God Is Neither The Thesis Of Individual Enterprise Nor The Antithesis Of Collective Enterprise, But A Synthesis Which Reconciles The Truths Of Both.

History Is The Long And Tragic Story Of The Fact That Privileged Groups Seldom Give Up Their Privileges Voluntarily.

When The Negro Finds The Courage To Be Free, He Faces Dogs And Guns And Clubs And Fire Hoses Totally Unafraid, And The White Men With Those Dogs, Guns, Clubs And Fire Hoses See That The Negro They Have Traditionally Called "boy" Has Become A Man.

We Must In Strength And Humility Meet Hate With Love.

Darkness Cannot Drive Out Darkness; Only Light Can Do That. Hate Cannot Drive Out Hate; Only Love Can Do That.

The Use Of Violence In Our Struggle Would Be Both Impractical And Immoral. To Meet Hate With Retaliatory Hate Would Do Nothing But Intensify The Existence Of Evil In The Universe. Hate Begets Hate; Violence Begets Violence; Toughness Begets A Greater Toughness. We Must Meet The Forces Of Hate With The Power Of Love; We Must Meet Physical Force With Soul Force. Our Aim Must Never Be To Defeat Or Humiliate The White Man, But To Win His Friendship And Understanding.

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 Two Thousand B.c., And It’s Wrong In Nineteen Fifty-four A.d.! It Always Has Been Wrong, And It Always Will Be Wrong!

Was Not Jesus An Extremist In Love? - "love Your Enemies, Bless Them That Curse You, Pray For Them That Despitefully Use You."

I Also Came To See That Liberalism's Superficial Optimism Concerning Human Nature Caused It To Overlook The Fact That Reason Is Darkened By Sin. The More I Thought About Human Nature The More I Saw How Our Tragic Inclination For Sin Causes Us To Use Our Minds To Rationalize Our Actions. Liberalism Failed To See That Reason By Itself Is Little More Than An Instrument To Justify Man's Defensive Ways Of Thinking. Reason, Devoid Of The Purifying Power Of Faith, Can Never Free Itself From Distortions And Rationalizations.

The Difference Between A Dreamer And A Visionary Is That A Dreamer Has His Eyes Closed And A Visionary Has His Eyes Open

There Is Nothing More Majestic Than The Determined Courage Of Individuals Willing To Suffer And Sacrifice For Their Freedom And Dignity.

Christianity Affirms That At The Heart Of Reality Is A Heart, A Loving Father Who Works Through History For The Salvation Of His Children. Man Cannot Save Himself, For Man Is Not The Measure Of All Things And Humanity Is Not God. Bound By The Chains Of His Own Sin And Finiteness, Man Needs A Savior.

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.

I Am Now Convinced That The Simplest Approach Will Prove To Be The Most Effective -- The Solution To Poverty Is To Abolish It Directly By A Now Widely Discussed Measure: The Guaranteed Income.

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

Even When The Polls Are Open To All, Negroes Have Shown Themselves Too Slow To Exercise Their Voting Privileges. There Must Be A Concerted Effort On The Part Of Negro Leaders To Arouse Their People From Their Apathetic Indifference.... In The Past, Apathy Was A Moral Failure. Today, It Is A Form Of Moral And Political Suicide.

Friends Are Forever Boys Are Whatever.

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.

Our Goal Is To Create A Beloved Community," Said Dr. King, "and This Will Require A Qualitative Change In Our Souls As Well As A Quantitative Change In Our Lives.

Beloved Community

Make A Career Of Humanity. Commit Yourself To The Noble Struggle For Equal Rights. You Will Make A Greater Person Of Yourself, A Greater Nation Of Your Country, And A Finer World To Live In.

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.

I Think If We, Say, If All Of The Major Leaders In This Struggle [for Human's Rights] Were At, At War With Each Other, Then I Think It Would Be Very Difficult To Make This Social Revolution The Kind Of Powerful Revolution That It's Proved To Be.

The Problem With Hatred And Violence Is That They Intensity The Fears Of The White Majority, And Leave Them Less Ashamed Of Their Prejudices Toward Negroes.

Ultimately A Great Nation Is A Compassionate Nation.

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

One Day The Absurdity Of The Almost Universal Human Belief In The Slavery Of Other Animals Will Be Palpable. We Shall Then Have Discovered Our Souls And Become Worthier Of Sharing This Planet With Them.

If Humanity Is To Progress, Gandhi Is Inescapable.

We Must Pursue Peaceful End Through Peaceful Means.

All Too Many Of Those Who Live In Affluent America Ignore Those Who Exist In Poor America; In Doing So, The Affluent Americans Will Eventually Have To Face Themselves With The Question That Eichman Chose To Ignore: How Responsible Am I For The Well-being Of My Fellows?

We've Been In The Mountain Of War. We've Been In The Mountain Of Violence. We've Been In The Mountain Of Hatred Long Enough. It Is Necessary To Move On Now, But Only By Moving Out Of This Mountain Can We Move To The Promised Land Of Justice And Brotherhood And The Kingdom Of God. It All Boils Down To The Fact That We Must Never Allow Ourselves To Become Satisfied With Unattained Goals. We Must Always Maintain A Kind Of Divine Discontent.

The Early Christians Rejoiced When They Were Deemed Worthy To Suffer For What They Believed. In Those Days The Church Was Not Merely A Thermometer That Recorded The Ideas And Principles O Popular Opinion; It Was A Thermostat That Transformed The Mores Of Society.

We Will Not Build A Peaceful World By Following A Negative Path. It Is Not Enough To Say We Will Not Wage War. It Is Necessary To Love Peace And Sacrifice For It. We Must Concentrate Not Merely On The Negative Expulsion Of War, But On The Positive Affirmation Of Peace

The Time Has Come For America To Hear The Truth About This Tragic War. In International Conflicts, The Truth Is Hard To Come By Because Most Nations Are Deceived About Themselves. Rationalizations And The Incessant Search For Scapegoats Are The Psychological Cataracts That Blind Us To Our Sins. But The Day Has Passed For Superficial Patriotism. He Who Lives With Untruth Lives In Spiritual Slavery.

We Must Move Forward In The Days Ahead With Audacious Faith. The Moral Arc Of The Universe Is Long But It Bends Toward Justice.

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.

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.

When People Get Caught Up With That Which Is Right And They Are Willing To Sacrifice For It, There Is No Stopping Point Short Of Victory.

Like Anybody, I Would Like To Have A Long Life. Longevity Has Its Place. But I'm Not Concerned About That Now. I Just Want To Do God's Will.

[malcolm X] Had Said A Great Deal About Nonviolence, Criticizing Nonviolence, And Saying That I Approved Of Negro Men And Women Being Bitten By Dogs And The Fire Hoses, And I Say, Say Go On And Not Defend Yourself. I Think This Kind Of Response Grew Out Of The Build Up, All Of The Talk About My Being A Sort Of Polished Uncle Tom.

The First Principle Of Value That We Need To Rediscover Is This: That All Reality Hinges On Moral Foundations. In Other Words, That This Is A Moral Universe, And That There Are Moral Laws Of The Universe Just As Abiding As The Physical Laws.

But Life At Its Best Is A Creative Synthesis Of Opposites In Fruitful Harmony.

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

One Who Breaks An Unjust Law Must Do So Openly, Lovingly, And With A Willingness To Accept The Penalty.

The Curse Of Poverty Has No Justification In Our Age...the Time Has Come For Us To Civilize Ourselves By The Total, Direct And Immediate Abolition Of Poverty.

I Cannot Forget That The Nobel Prize For Peace Was Also A Commission - A Commission To Work Harder Than I Had Ever Worked Before For "the Brotherhood Of Man".

Brotherhood Of Man

We Cannot Walk Alone.

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.

Love Is The Only Force Capable Of Transforming An Enemy Into Friend.

The Soft-minded Man Always Fears Change. He Feels Security In The Status Quo, And He Has An Almost Morbid Fear Of The New. For Him, The Greatest Pain Is The Pain Of A New Idea.

Moral Principles Have Lost Their Distinctiveness. For Modern Man, Absolute Right And Absolute Wrong Are A Matter Of What The Majority Is Doing.

Perhaps...the Nation And The World Are In Dire Need Of Creative Extremists.

Political Extremism

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.

Shallow Understanding From People Of Good Will Is More Frustrating Than Absolute Misunderstanding From People Of Ill Will.

We Must Come To See That The End We Seek Is A Society At Peace With Itself, A Society That Can Live With Its Conscience.

It All Boils Down To This: That All Life Is Interrelated.

Riots Are The Voices Of The Unheard.

I Was Much More Afraid In Montgomery When I Had A Gun In My House. When I Decided That I Couldn’t Keep A Gun, I Came Face-to-face With The Question Of Death And I Dealt With It. From That Point On, I No Longer Needed A Gun Nor Have I Been Afraid. Had We Become Distracted By The Question Of My Safety We Would Have Lost The Moral Offensive And Sunk To The Level Of Our Oppressors.

Your Self-image Should Not Come From The Job You Do But From How Well You Do Your Job.

[nonviolence] Seeks To Secure Moral Ends Through Moral Means.

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

The Purpose Of Direct Action Is To Create A Situation So Crisis-packed That It Will Inevitably Open The Door To Negotiation.

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.

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.

Truth Crushed To Earth Will Rise Again.

With All Of Its False Assumptions And Evil Methods, Communism Grew As A Protest Against The Hardships Of The Underprivileged. Communism In Theory Emphasized A Classless Society, And A Concern For Social Justice, Though The World Knows From Sad Experience That In Practice It Created New Classes And A New Lexicon Of Injustice.

He Should Sweep Streets So Well That All The Host Of Heaven And Earth Will Pause To Say, 'here Lives A Great Street-sweeper Who Did His Job Well'

Lord Help Me To See M. L. King As M. L. King In His True Perspective.

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.

America, You Must Be Born Again!

The Bombs In Vietnam Explode At Home; They Destroy The Hopes And Possibilities For A Decent America.

Once You Become Dedicated To A Cause, Personal Security Is Not The Goal. What Will Happen To You Personally Does Not Matter. My Cause, My Race, Is Worth Dying For.

For You Will Never Be What You Ought To Be Until They [your Fellow Humans] Are What They Ought To Be.

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

Trending Author

Matthew McConaughey

Stephen Leacock

John Dramani Mahama

Category