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We Have Moved Into An Era Where We Are Called Upon To Raise Certain Basic Questions About The Whole Society. We Are Still Called Upon To Give Aid To The Beggar Who Finds Himself In Misery And Agony On Life's Highway. But One Day, We Must Ask The Question Of Whether An Edifice Which Produces Beggars Must Not Be Restructured And Refurbished.

-Martin Luther King, Jr.

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We Have Moved Into

Martin Luther King, Jr.

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We Have Moved Into An Era Where We Are Called Upon To Raise Certain Basic Questions About The Whole Society. We Are Still Called Upon To Give Aid To The Beggar Who Finds Himself In Misery And Agony On Life's Highway. But One Day, We Must Ask The Question Of Whether An Edifice Which Produces Beggars Must Not Be Restructured And Refurbished.

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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.

Whenever You Are Engaged In Work That Serves Humanity And Is For The Building Of Humanity, It Has Dignity And It Has Worth.

We Have Guided Missiles And Misguided Men.

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.

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

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

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

In Spite Of Its Glowing Talk About The Welfare Of The Masses, Communism's Methods And Philosophy Strip Man Of His Dignity And Worth, Leaving Him As Little More Than A Depersonalized Cog In The Ever-turning Wheel Of The State.

In The End, We Will Remember Not The Words Of Our Enemies But The Silence Of Our Friends.

Never Succumb To The Temptation Of Becoming Bitter. As You Press For Justice, Be Sure To Move With Dignity And Discipline, Using Only The Instruments Of Love.

If You Succumb To The Temptation Of Using Violence In The Struggle, Unborn Generations Will Be The Recipients Of A Long And Desolate Night Of Bitterness, And Your Chief Legacy To The Future Will Be An Endless Reign Of Meaningless Chaos.

The Negro Who Experiences Bitter And Agonizing Circumstances As A Result Of Some Ungodly White Person Is Tempted To Look Upon All White Persons As Evil, If He Fails To Look Beyond His Circumstances. But The Minute He Looks Beyond His Circumstances And Sees The Whole Of The Situation, He Discovers That Some Of The Most Implacable And Vehement Advocates Of Racial Equality Are Consecrated White Persons.

Whenever The Early Christians Entered A Town The Power Structure Got Disturbed And Immediately Sought To Convict Them For Being "disturbers Of The Peace" And "outside Agitators." But They Went On With The Conviction That They Were "a Colony Of Heaven," And Had To Obey God Rather Than Man. They Were Small In Number But Big In Commitment. They Were Too God-intoxicated To Be "astronomically Intimidated." They Brought An End To Such Ancient Evils As Infanticide And Gladiatorial Contest.

It Really Boils Down To This: That All Life Is Interrelated. We Are All Caught In An Inescapable Network Of Mutuality, Tired Into A Single Garment Of Destiny. Whatever Affects One Destiny, Affects All Indirectly.

I Am In Birmingham Because Injustice Is Here. Just As The Eighth Century Prophets Left Their Little Villages And Carried Their "thus Saith The Lord" Far Beyond The Boundaries Of Their Home Towns; And Just As The Apostle Paul Left His Little Village Of Tarsus And Carried The Gospel Of Jesus Christ To Practically Every Hamlet And City Of The Graeco-roman World, I Too Am Compelled To Carry The Gospel Of Freedom Beyond My Particular Home Town. Like Paul, I Must Constantly Respond To The Macedonian Call For Aid.

The Evils Of Capitalism Are As Real As The Evils Of Militarism And Evils Of Racism.

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.

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

I Think That We Must Face The Fact That In Reality, You Cannot Have Economic And Political Equality Without Having Some Form Of Social Equality. I Think This Is Inevitable.

There Is Nothing New About Poverty. What Is New, However, Is That We Have The Resources To Get Rid Of It.

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.

I Was Not Afraid Of The Words Of The Violent, But Of The Silence Of The Honest.

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.

You Know, My Friends, There Comes A Time When People Get Tired Of Being Trampled Over By The Iron Feet Of Oppression. There Comes A Time, My Friends, When People Get Tired Of Being Plunged Across The Abyss Of Humiliation, Where They Experience The Bleakness Of Nagging Despair. There Comes A Time When People Get Tired Of Being Pushed Out Of The Glittering Sunlight Of Life’s July And Left Standing Amid The Piercing Chill Of An Alpine November.

It Is Love That Will Save Our World And Our Civilization.

Unconditional Love Will Have The Final Word In Reality.

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.

Our Eternal Message Of Hope Is That Dawn Will Come.

Wisdom Born Of Experience Should Tell Us That War Is Obsolete. There May Have Been A Time When War Served As A Negative Good By Preventing The Spread And Growth Of An Evil Force If We Assume That Life Is Worth Living, If We Assume That Mankind Has The Right To Survive, Then We Must Find An Alternative To War.

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

Justice Denied Anywhere Diminishes Justice Everywhere.

Nonviolent Action, The Negro Saw, Was The Way To Supplement, Not Replace, The Progress Of Change. It Was The Way To Divest Himself Of Passivity Without Arraying Himself In Vindictive Force.

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.

A True Revolution Of Values Will Soon Cause Us To Question The Fairness And Justice Of Many Of Our Present Policies.

Breaking Silence

Somehow We Must Transform The Dynamics Of The World Power Struggle From The Negative Nuclear Arms Race Which No One Can Win To A Positive Contest To Harness Man's Creative Genius For The Purpose Of Making Peace And Prosperity A Reality For All Of The Nations Of The World.

God Made The World From Nothing, And If We Can Be Nothing, Then God Can Make Something Of Us.

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

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

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.

You Can't Talk About Solving The Economic Problem Of The Negro Without Talking About Billions Of Dollars. You Can't Talk About Ending The Slums Without First Saying Profit Must Be Taken Out Of The Slums. You're Really Tampering And Getting On Dangerous Ground Because You Are Messing With Folk Then. You Are Messing With Captains Of Industry. Now This Means That We Are Treading In Difficult Water, Because It Really Means That We Are Saying That Something Is Wrong With Capitalism.

We Must All Learn To Live Together As Brothers. Or We Will All Perish Together As Foolsfor Some Strange Reason I Can Never Be What I Ought To Be Until You Are What You Ought To Be. And You Can Never Be What You Ought To Be Until I Am What I Ought To Be.

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.

I Imagine You Already Know That I Am Much More Socialistic In My Economic Theory Than Capitalistic.

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.

My Study Of Gandhi Convinced Me That True Pacifism Is Not Nonresistance To Evil, But Nonviolent Resistance To Evil. Between The Two Positions, There Is A World Of Difference. Gandhi Resisted Evil With As Much Vigor And Power As The Violent Resister, But True Pacifism Is Not Unrealistic Submission To Evil Power. It Is Rather A Courageous Confrontation Of Evil By The Power Of Love. . . .

The Major Problem Of Life Is Learning How To Handle The Costly Interruptions.

Stand Up For Justice, Stand Up For Truth; And God Will Be At Your Side Forever.

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.

We Must Face The Appalling Fact That We Have Been Betrayed By Both The Democratic And Republican Parties.

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

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

Unarmed Love Is The Most Powerful Force In All The World.

The Quality, Not The Longevity, Of One's Life Is What Is Important.

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

Never Again Can We Afford To Live With The Narrow, Provincial "outside Agitator" Idea. Anyone Who Lives Inside The United States Can Never Be Considered An Outsider.

But While So Many White Americans Are Unaware Of Conditions Inside The Ghetto, There Are Very Few Ghetto Dwellers Who Are Unaware Of The Life Outside. The Television Sets Bombard Them Day By Day With The Opulence Of The Larger Society.

Success, Recognition, And Conformity Are The Bywords Of The Modern World Where Everyone Seems To Crave The Anesthetizing Security Of Being Identified With The Majority.

There Is Something In The Soul That Cries Out For Freedom.

We As Christians Have A Mandate To Be Nonconformists.

Carve A Tunnel Of Hope Through The Dark Mountain Of Disappointment.

In A Real Sense Faith Is Total Surrender To God .

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

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

Black Power Is A Nihilistic Philosophy Born Out Of The Conviction That The Negro Can't Win... The View That American Society Is So Hopelessly Corrupt And Enmeshed In Evil That There Is No Possibility Of Salvation From Within.

Be The Best Of Whatever You Are.

Without Love, There Is No Reason To Know Anyone, For Love Will In The End Connect Us To Our Neighbors, Our Children And Our Hearts.

Our Age Is One Of Guided Missiles And Unguided Men.

A Third Reason Why We Should Love Our Enemies Is That Love Is The Only Force Capable Of Transforming An Enemy Into A Friend. We Never Get Rid Of An Enemy By Meeting Hate With Hate; We Get Rid Of An Enemy By Getting Rid Of Enmity. By Its Very Nature, Hate Destroys And Tears Down; By Its Very Nature, Love Creates And Builds Up. Love Transforms With Redemptive Power.

We Must In Strength And Humility Meet Hate With Love.

Morality Cannot Be Legislated, But Behavior Can Be Regulated. Judicial Decrees May Not Change The Heart, But They Can Restrain The Heartless.

There Is Something In This Universe That Justifies The Biblical Writer In Saying, "you Shall Reap What You Sow." This Is A Law-abiding Universe. This Is A Moral Universe. It Hinges On Moral Foundations. If We Are To Make Of This A Better World, We've Got To Go Back And Rediscover That Precious Value That We've Left Behind.

Each One Of Us Has The Power To Make Others Feel Better Or Worse. Making Others Feel Better Is Much More Fun Than Making Others Feel Worse. Making Others Feel Better Generally Makes Us Feel Better

I Just Want To Leave A Committed Life Behind.

We Will Never Have Peace In The World Until Men Everywhere Recognize That Ends Are Not Cut Off From Means, Because The Means Represent The Ideal In The Making, And The End In Process, And Ultimately You Can't Reach Good Ends Through Evil Means, Because The Means Represent The Seed And The End Represents The Tree.

We Should Never Forget That Everything Adolf Hitler Did In Germany Was “legal” And Everything The Hungarian Freedom Fighters Did In Hungary Was “illegal.” It Was “illegal” To Aid And Comfort A Jew In Hitler’s Germany. Even So, I Am Sure That, Had I Lived In Germany At The Time, I Would Have Aided And Comforted My Jewish Brothers. If Todayi Lived In A Communist Country Where Certain Principles Dear To The Christian Faith Are Suppressed, I Would Openly Advocate Disobeying That Country's Antireligious Laws.

We Ain't Goin' Study War No More.

Means We Use Must Be As Pure As The Ends We Seek.

Before You Finish Eating Breakfast In The Morning, You've Depended On More Than Half Of The World.

Evil Must Be Attacked By. . . The Day To Day Assault Of The Battering Rams Of Justice.

The Negro Cannot Win The Respect Of The White People Of The South Or The Peoples Of The World If He Is Willing To Sell The Future Of His Children For His Personal And Immediate Comfort And Safety.

There Are Often Multiple Sources For Some Famous Statements By King; As A Professional Speaker And Minister He Used Some Significant Phrases With Only Slight Variation Many Times In His Essays, Books, And His Speeches To Different Audiences.

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 May Have Been A Time When War Served As A Negative Good By Preventing The Spread And Growth Of An Evil Force, But The Destructive Power Of Modern Weapons Eliminates Even The Possibility That War May Serve As A Negative Good.

It Is Hardly A Moral Act To Encourage Others Patiently To Accept Injustice Which He Himself Does Not Endure.

Most Of These People Will Never Make The Headlines And Their Names Will Not Appear In Who's Who. Yet When Years Have Rolled Past And When The Blazing Light Of Truth Is Focused On This Marvelous Age In Which We Live - Men And Women Will Know And Children Will Be Taught That We Have A Finer Land, A Better People, A More Noble Civilization - Because These Humble Children Of God Were Willing To Suffer For Righteousness' Sake.

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

One Of The Great Liabilities Of History Is That All Too Many People Fail To Remain Awake Through Great Periods Of Social Change.

Social Activism

Everyone Has The Power For Greatness, Not For Fame But Greatness, Because Greatness Is Determined By Service.

I Just Want To Do God's Will. And He's Allowed Me To Go To The Mountain. And I've Looked Over, And I've Seen The Promised Land! I May Not Get There With You, But I Want You To Know Tonight That We As A People Will Get To The Promised Land.

In Our Society It Is Murder, Psychologically, To Deprive A Man Of A Job Or An Income. You Are In Substance Saying To That Man That He Has No Right To Exist. You Are In A Real Way Depriving Him Of Life, Liberty, And The Pursuit Of Happiness, Denying In His Case The Very Creed Of His Society.

Like A Boil That Must Be Opened With All Its Ugliness To The Natural Medicines Of Air And Light, Injustice Must Be Exposed To The Light Of Human Conscience Before It Can Be Cured.

We Must Accept Finite Disappointment, But Never Lose Infinite Hope.

We Are Now Faced With The Fact, My Friends, That Tomorrow Is Today. We Are Confronted With The Fierce Urgency Of Now.

Breaking Silence

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

Working Together

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.

Nothing Is So Much Needed As A Secure Family Life For A People Seeking To Rise Out Of Poverty And Backwardness.

Intelligence Plus Character-that Is The Goal Of True Education.

I Can Never Be What I Ought To Be Until You Are What You Ought To Be.

I Knew That I Could Never Again Raise My Voice Against The Violence Of The Oppressed In The Ghettos Without Having First Spoken Clearly To The Greatest Purveyor Of Violence In The World Today - My Own Government.... There Is Something Strangely Inconsistent About A Nation And A Press That Would Praise You When You Say, 'be Nonviolent Toward Jim Clark,' But Will Curse And Damn You When You Say, 'be Nonviolent Toward Little Brown Vietnamese Children!' There Is Something Wrong With That Press.

We Were All Involved In The Death Of John Kennedy. We Tolerated Hate; We Tolerated The Sick Stimulation Of Violence In All Walks Of Life; And We Tolerated The Differential Application Of Law, Which Said That A Man's Life Was Sacred Only If We Agreed With His Views.

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

We Did Not Hesitate To Call Our Movement An Army. But It Was A Special Army, With No Supplies But Its Sincerity, No Uniform But Its Determination, No Arsenal Except Its Faith, No Currency But Its Conscience.

Ten Cures For Depression Are To Go Out And Do Something For Someone Else And Repeat It Nine Times.

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.

If I Lived In China Or Even Russia, Or Any Totalitarian Country, Maybe I Could Understand Some Of These Illegal Injunctions. ... But Somewhere I Read Of The Freedom Of Assembly. Somewhere I Read Of The Freedom Of Speech. Somewhere I Read Of The Freedom Of The Press. Somewhere I Read That The Greatness Of America Is The Right To Protest For Right.

Join With The Earth And Each Other, To Bring New Life To The Land, To Restore The Waters, To Refresh The Air, To Renew The Forests, To Care For The Plants, To Protect The Creatures, To Celebrate The Seas, To Rejoice In The Sunlight, To Sing The Song Of The Stars, To Recall Our Destiny, To Renew Our Spirits, To Reinvigorate Our Bodies, To Recreate The Human Community, To Promote Justice And Peace, To Love Our Children And Love One Another, To Join Together As Many And Diverse Expressions Of One Loving Mystery, For The Healing Of The Earth And The Renewal Of All Life.

There May Be A Conflict Between Softminded Religionists And Toughminded Scientists, But Not Between Science And Religion.

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.

Hate Multiplies Hate, Violence Multiplies Violence, And Toughness Multiplies Toughness In A Descending Spiral Of Destruction.

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.

Human Progress Is Neither Automatic Nor Inevitable . . .

I Have A Dream Today!

Returning Hate For Hate Multiplies Hate, Adding Deeper Darkness To A Night Already Devoid Of Stars. Darkness Cannot Drive Out Darkness; Only Light Can Do That. Hate Cannot Drive Out Hate; Only Love Can Do That.

Before The Pilgrims Landed At Plymouth, We Were Here. Before The Pen Of Jefferson Etched Across The Pages Of History The Majestic Words Of The Declaration Of Independence, We Were Here. If The Inexpressible Cruelties Of Slavery Could Not Stop Us, The Opposition We Now Face Will Surely Fail. We Will Win Our Freedom Because The Sacred Heritage Of Our Nation And The Eternal Will Of God Are Embodied In Our Echoing Demands.

I Have A Dream That One Day, Down In Alabama, With Its Vicious Racists, With Its Governor Having His Lips Dripping With The Words Of "interposition" And "nullification" - One Day Right There In Alabama Little Black Boys And Black Girls Will Be Able To Join Hands With Little White Boys And White Girls As Sisters And Brothers.

And You Know, It's Possible That The Priest And The Levite Looked Over That Man On The Ground And Wondered If The Robbers Were Still Around. Or It's Possible That They Felt That The Man On The Ground Was Merely Faking. And He Was Acting Like He Had Been Robbed And Hurt, In Order To Seize Them Over There, Lure Them There For Quick And Easy Seizure. And So The First Question That The Levite Asked Was, "if I Stop To Help This Man, What Will Happen To Me?" But Then The Good Samaritan Came By. And He Reversed The Question: "if I Do Not Stop To Help This Man, What Will Happen To Him?

Oppressed People Cannot Remain Oppressed Forever. The Yearning For Freedom Eventually Manifests Itself.

Man Was Born Into Barbarism When Killing His Fellow Man Was A Normal Condition Of Existence. He Became Endowed With A Conscience. And He Has Now Reached The Day When Violence Toward Another Human Being Must Become As Abhorrent As Eating Another's Flesh.

A Lie Cannot Live.

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

As I Like To Say To The People In Montgomery: "the Tension In This City Is Not Between White People And Negro People. The Tension Is, At Bottom, Between Justice And Injustice, Between The Forces Of Light And The Forces Of Darkness.

If A City Has A 30% Negro Population, Then It Is Logical To Assume That Negroes Should Have At Least 30% Of The Jobs In Any Particular Company, And Jobs In All Categories Rather Than Only In Menial Areas.

Let Us Therefore Continue Our Triumphal March To The Realization Of The American Dream... For All Of Us Today, The Battle Is In Our Hands... The Road Ahead Is Not Altogether A Smooth One. There Are No Broad Highways That Lead Us Easily And Inevitably To Quick Solutions... We Are Still In For The Season Of Suffering... How Long? Not Long. Because No Lie Can Live Forever... Our God Is Marching On.

We Who In Engage In Nonviolent Direct Action Are Not The Creators Of Tension. We Merely Bring To The Surface The Hidden Tension That Is Already Alive.

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

Are You Able To Accept Blows Without Retaliating?" And "are You Able To Endure The Ordeals Of Jail?"

Faith Can Give Us Courage To Face The Uncertainties Of The Future.

Will We March Only To The Music Of Time, Or Will We, Risking Criticism And Abuse, March To The Soul-saving Music Of Eternity?

You Have To Keep Moving Forward

Keep Moving Forward

There's Something About Love That Builds Up And Is Creative. There Is Something About Hate That Tears Down And Is Destructive. So Love Your Enemies.

I Have Decided To Love. If You Are Seeking The Highest Good, I Think You Can Find It Through Love. And The Beautiful Thing Is That We Are Moving Against Wrong When We Do It, Because John Was Right, God Is Love. He Who Hates Does Not Know God, But He Who Has Love Has The Key That Unlocks The Door To The Meaning Of Ultimate Reality.

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

So When Jesus Says "love Your Enemies," He Is Setting Forth A Profound And Ultimately Inescapable Admonition.

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

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

Temporary Setbacks

Through Nonviolent Resistance The Negro Will Be Able To Rise To The Noble Height Of Opposing The Unjust System While Loving The Perpetrators Of The System.

And So We Shall Have To Do More Than Register And More Than Vote; We Shall Have To Create Leaders Who Embody Virtues We Can Respect, Who Have Moral And Ethical Principles We Can Applaud With Enthusiasm.

Ethical Principles

Whatever We Do, We Must Keep God In The Forefront. Let Us Be Christian In All Of Our Actions. But I Want To Tell You This Evening That It Is Not Enough For Us To Talk About Love, Love Is One Of The Pivotal Points Of The Christian Face, Faith. There Is Another Side Called Justice. And Justice Is Really Love In Calculation. Justice Is Love Correcting That Which Revolts Against Love.

Like Paul, I Must Constantly Respond To The Macedonian Call For Aid.

Let Us Not Wallow In The Valley Of Despair.

I Have A Dream Speech

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.

I Have A Dream That One Day Even The State Of Mississippi, A Desert State, Sweltering With The Heat Of Injustice And Oppression, Will Be Transformed Into An Oasis Of Freedom And Justice.

Racial Segregation Must Be Seen For What It Is, And That Is An Evil System, A New Form Of Slavery Covered Up With Certain Niceties Of Complexity.

Unless You Have Found Something In Life To Live For That Is More Important To You Than Your Own Life, You Will Always Be A Slave. For All Another Man Needs To Do Is Threaten To Take Your Life To Get You To Do His Bidding.

Nonviolence Is The Answer To The Crucial Political And Moral Questions Of Our Time: The Need For Man To Overcome Oppression And Violence Without Resorting To Oppression And Violence. Man Must Evolve For All Human Conflict A Method Which Rejects Revenge, Aggression And Retaliation. The Foundation Of Such A Method Is Love.

At Times, Life Is Hard, As Hard As Crucible Steel. It Has Its Bleak And Painful Moments. Like The Ever Flowing Water Of A River, Life Has Its Moments Of Drought And Its Moments Of Flood. Like The Ever-changin Cycle Of The Seasons, Life Has The Soothing Warmth Of The Summers And The Piercing Chill Of Its Winters. But Through It All, God Walks With Us. Never Forget That God Is Able To Lift You From The Fatigue Of Despair To The Buoyancy Of Hope, And Transform Dark And Desolate Valleys Into Sunlit Paths Of Inner Peace.

Love Is The Most Durable Power In The World. This Creative Force Is The Most Potent Instrument Available In Mankind's Quest For Peace And Security.

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 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.

Life's Most Persistent And Urgent Question Is, 'what Are You Doing For Others?'

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. The Broad Education Will, Therefore, Transmit To One Not Only The Accumulated Knowledge Of The Race But Also The Accumulated Experience Of Social Living. If We Are Not Careful, Our Colleges Will Produce A Group Of Close-minded, Unscientific, Illogical Propagandists, Consumed With Immoral Acts. Be Careful, Brethren! Be Careful, Teachers!

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

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."

We Decided To Set Our Direct-action Program Around The Easter Season, Realizing That, With Exception Of Christmas, This Was The Largest Shopping Period Of The Year. Knowing That A Strong Economic Withdrawal Program Would Be The By-product Of Direct Action.

What Good Is Having The Right To Sit At A Lunch Counter If You Can't Afford To Buy A Hamburger?

[w]e Are The Heirs Of A Past Of Rope, Fire, And Murder. I For One Am Not Ashamed Of This Past. My Shame Is For Those Who Became So Inhuman That They Could Inflict This Torture Upon Us.

The Way Of Acquiescence Leads To Moral And Spiritual Suicide. The Way Of Violence Leads To Bitterness In The Survivors And Brutality In The Destroyers. But, The Way Of Nonviolence Leads To Redemption And The Creation Of The Beloved Community.

Beloved Community

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.

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.

Education Without Morals Is Like A Ship Without A Compass, Merely Wandering Nowhere.

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.

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.

My Mommy Always Said There Were No Monsters - No Real Ones - But There Are.

I Agree With Dante, That The Hottest Places In Hell Are Reserved For Those Who In A Period Of Moral Crisis Maintain Their Neutrality. There Comes A Time When Silence Becomes Betrayal.

And I Say To You, I Have Decided To Stick With Love, For I Know That Love Is Ultimately The Only Answer To Mankind's Problems. And I'm Going To Talk About It Everywhere I Go. For I Have Seen Too Much Hate... Every Time I See It, I Know That It Does Something To Their Faces And Their Personalities, And I Say To Myself That Hate Is Too Great A Burden To Bear. I Have Decided To Love.

When Any Society Says That I Cannot Marry A Certain Person, That Society Has Cut Off A Segment Of My Freedom.

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

I Refuse To Accept The View . . . That The Bright Daybreak Of Peace And Brotherhood Can Never Become A Reality.

Unconditional Love

The Question Is No Longer Between Violence And Non-violence It Is Between Non-violence And Non-existence.

Philanthropy Is Commendable, But It Must Not Cause The Philanthropist To Overlook The Circumstances Of Economic Injustice Which Make Philanthropy Necessary.

Truth Is Not To Be Found Either In Traditional Capitalism Or In Marxism. Each Represents A Partial Truth. Historically, Capitalism Failed To Discern The Truth In Collective Enterprise And Marxism Failed To See The Truth In Individual Enterprise.

For You All Think God Is One Who Rewards Good And Punishes Evil, But I Say To You That God Is One Who Loves You And Has Compassion For Everyone. You Just Have To Pray To Him And Believe In Him. He Will Always Be Your Guiding Light.

The Universe Is On The Side Of Justice

On The One Hand We Are Called To Play The Good Samaritan On Life's Roadside; But That Will Be Only An Initial Act. One Day We Must Come To See That The Whole Jericho Road Must Be Transformed So That Men And Women Will Not Be Constantly Beaten And Robbed As They Make Their Journey On Life's Highway. True Compassion Is More Than Flinging A Coin To A Beggar; It Is Not Haphazard And Superficial. It Comes To See That An Edifice Which Produces Beggars Needs Restructuring. "a Time To Break Silence," At Riverside Church

Almost Always, The Creative Dedicated Minority Has Made The World Better.

Resistance And Nonviolence Are Not In Themselves Good. There Is Another Element That Must Be Present In Our Struggle That Then Makes Our Resistance And Nonviolence Truly Meaningful. That Element Is Reconciliation. Our Ultimate End Must Be The Creation Of The Beloved Community.

Beloved Community

Our Generation Will Not Have Regretted Both Perverse Crimes, And The Eerie Silence Of The Kind

One Has A Moral Responsibility To Disobey Unjust Laws.

True Peace Is Not Merely The Absence Of Tension: It Is The Presence Of Justice.

I Think One Can Live In American Society With A Certain Cultural Heritage, Whether It's An African Heritage Or Other, European,what Have You, And Still Absorb A Great Deal Of This Culture. There Is Always Cultural Assimilation.

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.

The Means By Which We Live Have Outdistanced The Ends For Which We Live.

Inspirational Life

America Must Begin The Struggle For Democracy At Home. The Advocacy Of Free Elections In Europe By American Officials Is Hypocrisy When Free Elections Are Not Held In Great Sections Of America.

The Hope Of A Secure And Livable World Lies With Disciplined Nonconformists Who Are Dedicated To Justice, Peace And Brotherhood.

Before The Pilgrims Landed At Plymouth, We Were Here. Before The Pen Of Jefferson Etched Across The Pages Of History The Majestic Words Of The Declaration Of Independence, We Were Here.

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.

When You Are Right You Cannot Be Too Radical; When You Are Wrong, You Cannot Be Too Conservative.

Thought Provoking

What Seems So Necessary Today May Not Even Be Desirable Tomorrow.

A Social Movement That Only Moves People Is Merely A Revolt. A Movement That Changes Both People And Institutions Is A Revolution.

When We Rise In The Morning... At The Table We Drink Coffee Which Is Provided To Us By A South American, Or Tea By A Chinese, Or Cocoa By A West African; Before We Leave For Our Jobs We Are Already Beholden To More Than Half The World.

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.

Somewhere Somebody Must Have Some Sense. Men Must See That Force Begets Force, Hate Begets Hate, Toughness Begets Toughness. And It Is All A Descending Spiral, Ultimately Ending In Destruction For All And Everybody. 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.

We Must Move Past Indecision To Action. We Must Find New Ways To Speak For Peace In Vietnam And For Justice Throughout The Developing World, A World That Borders On Our Doors. If We Do Not Act, We Shall Surely Be Dragged Down The Long, Dark, And Shameful Corridors Of Time Reserved For Those Who Possess Power Without Compassion, Might Without Morality, And Strength Without Sight.

Our Scientific Power Has Outrun Our Spiritual Power. We Have Guided Missiles And Misguided Men.

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

Procrastinatio N Is Still The Thief Of Time.

A Piece Of Freedom Is No Longer Enough For Human Beings...unlike Bread, A Slice Of Liberty Does Not Finish Hunger. Freedom Is Like Life. It Cannot Be Had In Installments. Freedom Is Indivisible--we Have It All, Or We Are Not Free.

Now Let Us Begin. Now Let Us Rededicate Ourselves To The Long And Bitter - But Beautiful - Struggle For A New World.

Civilization And Violence Are Antithetical Concepts.

We Still Have A Choice Today: Nonviolent Coexistence Or Violent Co-annihilation. This May Well Be Mankind's Last Chance To Choose Between Chaos And Community.

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