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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.

-Martin Luther King, Jr.

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We've Been In The

Martin Luther King, Jr.

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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.

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Today, Is A Great Day To Make A Difference For Someone. 'i Have A Dream'.

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

Social Transformation

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

Vanity Asks, Is It Popular? Politics Ask, Will It Work? But Conscience And Morality Ask, Is It Right?

Don't Allow Anybody To Make You Feel That You're Nobody.

If You've Got Nothing Worth Dying For, You've Got Nothing Worth Living For.

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

Seeing Is Not Always Believing.

Hatred Darkens Life; Love Illumines It.

The Question Is Not Whether We Will Be Extremists, But What Kind Of Extremists We Will Be... The Nation And The World Are In Dire Need Of Creative Extremists.

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.

We Can Either Walk The Highroad Of Brotherhood Or The Low Road Of Man's Inhumanity To Man.

Inhumanity To Man

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.

Somehow This Madness Must Cease. We Must Stop Now. I Speak As A Child Of God And Brother To The Suffering Poor Of Vietnam. I Speak For Those Whose Land Is Being Laid Waste, Whose Homes Are Being Destroyed, Whose Culture Is Being Subverted. I Speak For The Poor In America Who Are Paying The Double Price Of Smashed Hopes At Home And Death And Corruption In Vietnam. I Speak As A Citizen Of The World, For The World As It Stands Aghast At The Path We Have Taken. I Speak As An American To The Leaders Of My Own Nation. The Great Initiative In This War Is Ours. The Initiative To Stop It Must Be Ours.

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

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

We Will Not Be Satisfied Until Justice Rolls Down Like Waters.

I Have A Dream Speech

I Think In This Phase, After The Negro Emerges In And From The Desegregated Society, Then A Great Deal Of Time Must Be Spent In Improving Standards Which Lag Behind To A Large Extent Because Of Segregation,discrimination, And The Legacy Of Slavery.

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.

Life's Most Persistent And Urgent Question Is: What Are You Doing For Others? Living Is A Form Of Not Being Sure, Not Knowing What Next Or How. The Moment You Know How, You Begin To Die A Little.

If We Get Setbacks And If Something Happens Where The Civil Rights Bill Is Watered Down, For Instance, If The Negro Feels That He Can Do Nothing But Move From One Ghetto To Another And One Slum To Another, The Despair And The Disappointment Will Be So Great That It Will Be Very Difficult To Keep The Struggle Disciplined And Nonviolent.

We Are Out To Defeat Injustice And Not White Persons Who May Be Unjust.

A Riot Is The Language Of The Unheard. On Blacks In America; Address At Birmingham Al

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

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 Cannot Make Myself Believe That God Wanted Me To Hate. I'm Tired Of Violence, I've Seen Too Much Of It. I've Seen Such Hate On The Faces Of Too Many Sheriffs In The South. And I'm Not Going To Let My Oppressor Dictate To Me What Method I Must Use. Our Oppressors Have Used Violence. Our Oppressors Have Used Hatred. Our Oppressors Have Used Rifles And Guns. I'm Not Going To Stoop Down To Their Level. I Want To Rise To A Higher Level. We Have A Power That Can't Be Found In Molotov Cocktails.

One Of The Most Persistent Ambiguities That We Face Is That Everybody Talks About Peace As A Goal. However, It Does Not Take Sharpest-eyed Sophistication To Discern That While Everbody Talks About Peace, Peace Has Become Practically Nobody's Business Among The Power-wielders. Many Men Cry Peace! Peace! But They Refuse To Do The Things That Make For Peace.

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.

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.

Rioting Is Not Revolutionary.

Freedom Only Comes Through Persistent Revolt, Through Persistent Agitation, Through Persistently Rising Up Against The System Of Evil.

True Compassion Is More Than Flinging A Coin To A Beggar; It Comes To See That An Edifice Which Produces Beggars Needs Restructuring.

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.'

But By All Means, Keep Moving.

And See Ominous Clouds Of Inferiority Beginning To Form In Her Little Mental Sky.

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.

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.

Now Is The Time To Rise From The Dark And Desolate Valley Of Segregation To The Sunlit Path Of Racial Justice.

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

We Shall Match Your Capacity To Inflict Suffering By Our Capacity To Endure Suffering. We Will Meet Your Physical Force With Soul Force. Do To Us What You Will And We Will Still Love You....bomb Our Homes And Threaten Our Children, And, As Difficult As It Is, We Will Still Love You.

Where Evil Men Would Seek To Perpetuate An Unjust Status Quo, Good Men Must Seek To Bring Into Being A Real Order Of Justice.

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

Political Extremism

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Justice Is Love Correcting That Which Revolts Against Love.

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As Long As The Mind Is Enslaved, The Body Can Never Be Free.

The Curse Of Poverty Has No Justification In Our Age.

Find A Voice In A Whisper.

By Nonviolent Resistance, The Negro Can Also Enlist All Men Of Good Will In His Struggle For Equality.

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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.

A Strong Man Must Be Militant As Well As Moderate. He Must Be A Realist As Well As An Idealist.

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

Breaking Silence

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

So I'm Happy Tonight. I'm Not Worried About Anything. I'm Not Fearing Any Man. Mine Eyes Have Seen The Glory Of The Coming Of The Lord!

For Years Now I Have Heard The Word "wait." It Rings In The Ear Of Every Negro With A Piercing Familiarity. This "wait" Has Almost Always Meant "never."

Be Concerned About Your Brother...eithe R We Go Up Together, Or We Go Down Together.

In The Current Struggle, There Is One Positive Course Of Action. There Is No Alternative, For The Alternative Would Connote A Rear March.

It's Not How Long You Live, It's How Well You Live.

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.

We Aren't Going To Let Any Mace Stop Us. We Are Masters In Our Nonviolent Movement In Disarming Police Forces; They Don't Know What To Do.

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?'

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.

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.

The Spirit Of Lincoln Still Lives; That Spirit Born Of The Teachings Of The Nazarene, Who Promised Mercy To The Merciful, Who Lifted The Lowly, Strengthened The Weak, Ate With Publicans, And Made The Captives Free. In The Light Of This Divine Example, The Doctrines Of Demagogues Shiver In Their Chaff.

We Are Called To Speak For The Weak, For The Voiceless, For The Victims Of Our Nation And For Those It Calls Enemy, For No Document From Human Hands Can Make These Humans Any Less Our Brothers And Sisters.

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.

Too Unconcerned To Love And Too Passionless To Hate, Too Detached To Be Selfish And Too Lifeless To Be Unselfish, Too Indifferent To Experience Joy And Too Cold To Express Sorrow, They Are Neither Dead Nor Alive; They Merely Exist.

Far From Being Disturbed By The Presence Of The Church, The Power Structure Of The Average Community Is Consoled By The Church's Often Vocal Sanction Of Things As They Are.

Only In The Darkness Can You See The Stars.

Nonviolence Is An Imperative In Order To Bring About Ultimate Community.

The Modern Choice Is Between Non-violence Or Non-existence.

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.

It Is Not Enough For Me To Stand Before You Tonight And Condemn Riots. It Would Be Morally Irresponsible For Me To Do That Without, At The Same Time, Condemning The Contingent, Intolerable Conditions That Exist In Our Society. These Conditions Are The Things That Cause Individuals To Feel That They Have No Other Alternative Than To Engage In Violent Rebellions To Get Attention. And I Must Say Tonight That A Riot Is The Language Of The Unheard.

Voting Is The Foundation Stone For Political Action.

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.

Let The Negro March. Let Him Make Pilgrimages To City Hall. Let Him Go On Freedom Rides. And Above All, Make An Effort To Understand Why He Must Do This. For If His Frustration And Despair Are Allowed To Continue Piling Up, Millions Of Negroes Will Seek Solace And Security In Black-nationalist Ideologies. And This, Inevitably, Would Lead To A Frightening Racial Nightmare.

Music Is The Best Consolation For A Despaired Man

Everyone Has An Opportunity To Be Great Because Everyone Has An Opportunity To Serve.

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 Purposeless To Tell Negroes They Should Not Be Enraged When They Should Be. Indeed, They Will Be Mentally Healthier If They Do Not Suppress Rage, But Vent It Constructively And Use Its Energy Peacefully But Forcefully To Cripple The Operations Of An Oppressive Society. Civil Disobedience Can Utilize The Militance Wasted In Riots To Seize Clothes Or Groceries Many Do Not Even Want.

I Am Convinced That...in The Struggle For Righteousness Man Has Cosmic Companionship.

Forgiveness Does Not Mean Ignoring What Has Been Done Or Putting A False Label On An Evil Act. It Means, Rather, That The Evil Act No Longer Remains As A Barrier To The Relationship. Forgiveness Is A Catalyst Creating The Atmosphere Necessary For A Fresh Start And A New Beginning.

Nonviolence Is Absolute Commitment To The Way Of Love. Love Is Not Emotional Bash; It Is Not Empty Sentimentalism. It Is The Active Outpouring Of One's Whole Being Into The Being Of Another.

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.

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.

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.

The Only Time People Do Not Like Praise Is When Too Much Of It Is Going Toward Someone Else.

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.

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.

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

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...'

Just As It Is The Duty Of All Men To Obey Just Laws, So It Is The Duty Of All Men To Disobey Unjust Laws.

God Has Given Each Normal Person A Capacity To Achieve Some End. True, Some Are Endowed With More Talent Than Others, But God Has Left None Of Us Talentless.

Within The Best Of Us, There Is Some Evil, And Within The Worst Of Us, There Is Some Good. When We Come To See This, We Take A Different Attitude Toward Individuals.

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

Love Your Enemies

We May Have All Come On Different Ships, But We're In The Same Boat Now.

It Is Obvious Today That America Has Defaulted On This Promissory Note Insofar As Her Citizens Of Color Are Concerned. Instead Of Honoring This Sacred Obligation, America Has Given The Negro People A Bad Check, A Check Which Has Come Back Marked 'insufficient Funds.'

Faith Is Taking The First Step Even When You Don't See The Whole Staircase.

There Are More Negroes In Jail With Me Than There Are On The Voting Rolls.

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.

School Takes 13 Years, Because That Is How Long It Takes To Break A Child's Spirit.

Lukewarm Acceptance Is More Bewildering Than Outright Rejection.

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.

Certainly I'm Not Saying That You Sit Down And Patiently Accept Injustice. I'm Talking About A Very Strong Force, Where You Stand Up With All Your Might Against An Evil System, And You Are Not A Coward.

You Can Have No Influence Over Those For Whom You Have Underlying Contempt.

Nonviolent Communication

I'm Concerned About A Better World. I'm Concerned About Justice; I'm Concerned About Brotherhood; I'm Concerned About Truth. And When One Is Concerned About That, He Can Never Advocate Violence. For Through Violence You May Murder A Murderer, But You Can't Murder Murder. Through Violence You May Murder A Liar, But You Can't Establish Truth. Through Violence You May Murder A Hater, But You Can't Murder Hate Through Violence. Darkness Cannot Put Out Darkness; Only Light Can Do That.

This Business Of Burning Human Beings With Napalm, Of Filling Our Nation's Homes With Orphans And Widows, Of Injecting Poisonous Drugs Of Hate Into Veins Of Peoples Normally Humane, Of Sending Men Home From Dark And Bloody Battlefields Physically Handicapped And Psychologically Deranged, Cannot Be Reconciled With Wisdom, Justice And Love.

Slaves Do Not Always Welcome Their Deliverers. They Become Accustomed To Being Slaves. They Would Rather Gear Those Ills They Have

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.

As Marvelous As The Stars Is The Mind Of The Person Who Studies Them.

My Parents Would Always Tell Me That I Should Not Hate The White Man, But That It Was My Duty As A Christian To Love Him.

I Do Think There Must Be Centralized Leadership In The Sense That, Say, In Our Struggle All Of The Leaders Coordinate Their Efforts, Cooperate And, And At Least Evince A Degree Of Unity.

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

Love Even For Enemies Is The Key To The Solution Of The Problems Of Our World.

I Have Come To See More And More That One Of The Most Decisive Steps That The Negro Can Take Is That Little Walk To The Voting Booth. That Is An Important Step. We've Got To Gain The Ballot, And Through That Gain, Political Power.

A Time Comes When Silence Is Betrayal. Even When Pressed By The Demands Of Inner Truth, Men Do Not Easily Assume The Task Of Opposing Their Government's Policy, Especially In Time Of War. Nor Does The Human Spirit Move Without Great Difficulty Against All The Apathy Of Conformist Thought, Within One's Own Bosom And In The Surrounding World.

Good And Just Society Is Neither The Thesis Of Capitalism Nor The Antithesis Of Communism, But A Socially Conscious Democracy Which Reconciles The Truths Of Individualism And Collectivism.

We Must Concentrate Not Merely On The Negative Expulsion Of War But The Postive Affirmation Of Peace.

Human Progress Is Neither Automatic Nor Inevitable . . .

Black Power Alone Is No More Insurance Against Social Injustice Than White Power.

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.

Our Lives Begin To End The Day We Become Silent About Things That Matter.

Why Is The Church Always A Taillight Rather Than A Headlight?

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.

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

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

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.

The Words 'i Will Forgive You, But I'll Never Forget What You've Done' Never Explain The Real Nature Of Forgiveness.

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

If America's Soul Becomes Totally Poisoned, Part Of The Autopsy Must Read Vietnam. It Can Never Be Saved So Long As It Destroys The Hopes Of Men The World Over.

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

In Our Struggle Against Racial Segregation In Montgomery, Alabama, I Came To See At A Very Early Stage That A Synthesis Of Gandhi's Method Of Nonviolence And The Christian Ethic Of Love Is The Best Weapon Available To Negroes For This Struggle For Freedom And Human Dignity. It May Well Be That The Gandhian Approach Will Bring About A Solution To The Race Problem In America. His Spirit Is A Continual Reminder To Oppressed People That It Is Possible To Resist Evil And Yet Not Resort To Violence.

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

We Must Have Our Freedom Now. We Must Have The Right To Vote. We Must Have Equal Protection Of The Law.

The Negro's Problem Will Not Be Solved By Running Away.

The United States Is The Largest Exporter Of Violence In The World

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.

[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.

I Would Rather Be A Man Of Conviction Than A Man Of Conformity

Every Man Must Decide Whether He Will Walk In The Light Of Creative Altruism Or In The Darkness Of Destructive Selfishness.

I Could Never Adjust To The Separate Waiting Rooms, Separate Eating Places, Separate Rest Rooms, Partly Because The Separate Was Always Unequal, And Partly Because The Very Idea Of Separation Did Something To My Sense Of Dignity And Self-respect.

Hate Destroys The Hater.

What Affects One In A Major Way, Affects All In A Minor Way.

We Were Not Unmindful Of The Difficulties Involved. So We Decided To Go Through A Process Of Self-purification.

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.

Now Let Me Say That The Next Thing We Must Be Concerned About If We Are To Have Peace On Earth And Good Will Toward Men Is The Nonviolent Affirmation Of The Sacredness Of All Human Life. Every Man Is Somebody Because He Is A Child Of God.

I Am Not Afraid Of The Word Tension.

Creative Tension

The Curse Of Poverty Has No Justification In Our Age. It Is Socially As Cruel And Blind As The Practice Of Cannibalism At The Dawn Of Civilization, When Men Ate Each Other Because They Had Not Yet Learned To Take Food From The Soil Or To Consume The Abundant Animal Life Around Them. The Time Has Come For Us To Civilize Ourselves By The Total, Direct And Immediate Abolition Of Poverty.

Capitalism Does Not Permit An Even Flow Of Economic Resources. With This System, A Small Privileged Few Are Rich Beyond Conscience, And Almost All Others Are Doomed To Be Poor At Some Level. That's The Way The System Works. And Since We Know That The System Will Not Change The Rules, We Are Going To Have To Change The System.

It Is A Sad Fact That Because Of Comfort, Complacency, A Morbid Fear Of Communism, And Our Proneness To Adjust To Injustice, The Western Nations That Initiated So Much Of The Revolutionary Spirit Of The Modern World Have Now Become The Arch-antirevolutionaries.

Breaking Silence

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

Now Is The Time To Make Justice A Reality For All Of God's Children.

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

The Existence Of Poverty In The Us Should Not Be Accepted As A Necessary Evil Or Insoluble Problem, But Should Be Considered A Crisis Requiring Emergency Measures. It Is A Matter Of Will And Priorities, Not A Matter Of Resources.

A Riot Is The Language Of The Unheard.

Never Succumb To The Temptation Of Bitterness.

There Can Be No Deep Disappointment Where There Is Not Deep Love.

You Don't Have To See The Whole Staircase, Just Take The First Step.

I Came To The Conclusion That There Is An Existential Moment In Your Life When You Must Decide To Speak For Yourself; Nobody Else Can Speak For You.

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.

Violence Never Brings Permanent Peace. It Solves No Social Problem: It Merely Creates New And More Complicated Ones.

History Is A Great Teacher. Now Everyone Knows That The Labor Movement Did Not Diminish The Strength Of The Nation But Enlarged It. By Raising The Living Standards Of Millions, Labor Miraculously Created A Market For Industry And Lifted The Whole Nation To Undreamed Of Levels Of Production. Those Who Attack Labor Forget These Simple Truths, But History Remembers Them.

Labour Movement

Injustice Anywhere Is A Threat To Justice Everywhere.

There Is Such A Thing As Being Too Late. This Is No Time For Apathy Or Complacency. This Is A Time For Vigorous And Positive Action.

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.

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.

I Choose To Give My Life For Those Who Have Been Left Out Of The Sunlight Of Opportunity

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 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

Every Now And Then I Think About My Own Death, And I Think About My Own Funeral. [...] Every Now And Then I Ask Myself, 'what Is It That I Would Want Said?' I'd Like Somebody To Mention That Day, That Martin Luther King, Jr., Tried To Give His Life Serving Others. I'd Like For Somebody To Say That Day, That Martin Luther King, Jr., Tried To Love Somebody.

My Place Is In The Sunlight Of Opportunity.

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

A Final Victory Is An Accumulation Of Many Short-term Encounters. To Lightly Dismiss A Success Because It Does Not Usher In A Complete Order Of Justice Is To Fail To Comprehend The Process Of Achieving Full Victory.

Capitalism Started Out With A Noble And High Motive, But Like Most Human Systems It Fell Victim To The Very Thing It Was Revolting Against.

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

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.

Millions Of Citizens Are Deeply Disturbed That The Military-industrial Complex Too Often Shapes National Policy, But They Do Not Want To Be Considered Unpatriotic.

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.

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

The Softminded Person Always Wants To Freeze The Moment And Hold Life In The Gripping Yoke Of Sameness.

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.

Nothing Pains Some People More Than Having To Think

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

We Cannot Be Truly Christian People So Long As We Flaunt The Central Teachings Of Jesus: Brotherly Love And The Golden Rule.

Let Us Be Those Creative Dissenters Who Will Call Our Beloved Nation To A Higher Destiny. To A New Plateau Of Compassion, To A More Noble Expression Of Humanness.

What Are You Doing For Others?

Many Of The Ugly Pages Of American History Have Been Obscured And Forgotten....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.

Whatever My Doubts, However Heavy The Burden, I Feel That I Must Accept The Task Of Helping To Make This Nation And This World A Better Place To Live In - For All Men, Black And White Alike.

Black And White

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.

Set Yourself Earnestly To Discover What You Are Made To Do, And Then Give Yourself Passionately To The Doing Of It.

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Jacques Maritain

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