[Chaplain2008] Quotes from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

[Pat Richeson]

Greetings Friends!

In honor of yesterday's observance of Dr. King's birthday, I've attached 
a list of 30+ of my favorite Dr. King quotes.  There should be something 
of inspiration for everyone.  Please recoginze that the absence of 
gender inclusive langauge is a product of historical setting.  Best to all!

Peace,
Adam


Great Quotes of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of  
comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and  
controversy.

Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love  
harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the  final 
word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is  stronger 
than evil triumphant.

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a  
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but  by 
the content of their character.

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 is some  
good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we  
discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies.

Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole  
staircase, just take the first step.

Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate  cannot 
drive out hate; only love can do that.

I submit to you that if a man hasn't discovered something that he will  
die for, he isn't fit to live.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.

Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but  also 
internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man,  but 
you refuse to hate him.

Nonviolence is a powerful and just weapon which cuts without wounding  
and ennobles the man who wields it. It is a sword that heals.

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.

The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: "If I  
stop to help this man, what will happen to me?" But... the good  
Samaritan reversed the question: "If I do not stop to help this man,  
what will happen to him?"

Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge,  
aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for  
others?'

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.

The art of acceptance is the art of making someone who has just done  
you a small favor wish that he might have done you a greater one.

The time is always right to do what is right.

I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him  
is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in  
order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is  
in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.

Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating  than 
absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will.

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.

Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative  
altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.

If a man is called to be a streetsweeper, he should sweep streets even  
as Michelangelo 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 streetsweeper  
who did his job well.

He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who  helps 
to perpetrate it. He who accepts evil without protesting against  it is 
really cooperating with it.

Everybody can be great... because anybody can serve. You don't have to  
have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject  and 
verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul  
generated by love.

Peace is not merely a distant goal that we seek, but a means by which  
we arrive at that goal.

We may have all come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now.

Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would  
still plant my apple tree.

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.

Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must  
love our enemies - or else? The chain reaction of evil - hate  begetting 
hate, wars producing more wars - must be broken, or else we  shall be 
plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.

Human salvation lies in the hands of the creatively maladjusted.




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