“Only through an inner spiritual transformation do we gain the strength to fight vigorously the evils of the world in a humble and loving spirit.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“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?”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“It may well be that we will have to repent in this generation. Not merely for the vitriolic words and the violent actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence and indifference of the good people who sit around and say, "Wait on time.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“Whatever I was, I owed to my family and to all those who struggled with me. But my biggest debt I owed to my wife. She was the one who gave my life meaning. All I could pledge to her, and to all those millions, was that I would do all I could to justify the faith that she, and they, had in me. I would try more than ever to make my life one of which she, and they, could be proud. I would do in private that which I knew my public responsibility demanded.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“You may be 38 years old, as I happen to be. And one day, some great opportunity stands before you and calls you to stand up for some great principle, some great issue, some great cause. And you refuse to do it because you are afraid…. You refuse to do it because you want to live longer…. You’re afraid that you will lose your job, or you are afraid that you will be criticized or that you will lose your popularity, or you’re afraid that somebody will stab you, or shoot at you or bomb your house; so you refuse to take the stand.
Well, you may go on and live until you are 90, but you’re just as dead at 38 as you would be at 90. And the cessation of breathing in your life is but the belated announcement of an earlier death of the spirit.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“The time had come- indeed it was past due- when I had to disavow and dissociate myself from those who in the name of peace burn, maim, and kill.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“The means by which we live have outdistanced the ends for which we live. Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“If we look at our history with honesty and clarity we will be forced to admit that our federal form of government has been, from the day of its birth, weakened in integrity, confused and confounded in its direction, by the unresolved race question. It is as if a political thalidomide drug taken during pregnancy caused the birth of a crippled nation.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“People fail to get along because they fear each other; they fear each other because they don't know each other; they don't know each other because they have not communicated with each other.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“All of the people of the world cannot do the so-called big things. Some of us will have to be content doing the so-called little things, but we must do the little things in a big way. We must do the ordinary things in an extraordinary manner. And we must overcome our sense of inferiority by doing just this - by somehow accepting that we have to do and doing that well”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“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.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“it is just as wrong, or even perhaps more so, to use moral means to preserve immoral ends.”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“I was in the kitchen drinking coffee when I heard Coretta cry, "Martin, Martin, come quickly!" I put down my cup and ran toward the living room. As I approached the front window Coretta pointed joyfully to a slowly moving bus: "Darling, it's empty!”
―
Martin Luther King Jr
“One's dignity may be assaulted, vandalized, cruelly mocked, but it an never be taken away unless it is surrendered.”
tag:
Dignity
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