“This is the unusual thing about nonviolence -- nobody is defeated, everybody shares in the victory.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“Cowardice asks the question, 'Is it safe?' Expediency asks the question, 'Is it politic?' Vanity asks the question, 'Is it popular?' But, conscience asks the question, 'Is it right?' And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but one must take it because one's conscience tells one that it is right”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“Oh, the worst of all tragedies is not to die young, but to live until I am seventy-five and yet not ever truly to have lived.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“The whirlwinds of revolt will continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“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 humanity.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“I said to my children, 'I'm going to work and do everything that I can do to see that you get a good education. I don't ever want you to forget that there are millions of God's children who will not and cannot get a good education, and I don't want you feeling that you are better than they are. For you will never be what you ought to be until they are what they ought to be.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“It is simply my way of saying that I would rather be a man of conviction than a man of conformity. Occasionally in life one develops a conviction so precious and meaningful that he will stand on it till the end. That is what I have found in nonviolence.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“...we are always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty; but we must move on.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“...and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky...”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“In our society, it is psychological murder to deprive a man of a job...you are in substance saying to that man "You have no right to exist.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“So often the contemporary church is a weak, ineffectual voice with an uncertain sound. So often it is an archdefender of the status quo. Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church’s silent—and often even vocal—sanction of things as they are. But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If today’s church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. Every day I meet young people whose disappointment with the church has turned into outright disgust.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“The only weapon that we have in our hands this evening is the weapon of protest. That's all.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
