Martin Luther King, Jr. Quotes

“The Darwinian concept of the survival of the fittest has been substituted by a philosophy of the survival of the slickest.”

“We have waited for more than three hundred and forty years for our constitutional and God-given rights.”

“It is not a sign of weakness, but a sign of high maturity, to rise to the level of self-criticism.”

“Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction.”

“Had it not been for the ministry of my good friend Dr. Billy Graham, my work in the civil rights movement would not have been as successful as it has been.”

“The strong man holds in a living blend strongly marked opposites. The idealists are not usually realistic, and the realists are not usually idealistic. The militant are not generally known to be passive, nor the passive to be militant. Seldom are the humble self-assertive, or the self-assertive humble. But life at it's best is a creative synthesis of opposites in fruitful harmony.”

“Though we live in the colony of time, we are ultimately responsible to the empire of eternity.”

“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.”

“Violence is anything that denies human integrity, and leads to hopelessness and helplessness.”

“The ability to lead a happy life is made, not found”

“The surest way to be happy is to seek happiness for others.”

“Never could I advocate nonviolence in this country and not advocate nonviolence for the whole world.”

“Hate destroys the very structure of the personality of the hater.”

“Justice is love correcting that which revolts against love.”

“One day we shall win freedom, but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory.”

“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.”

“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.”

“Three simple words can describe the nature of the social revolution that is talking place and what Negroes really want. They are the words "all," "now," and "here."”

“Many men cry Peace! Peace! but they refuse to do the things that make for peace.”

“As we have seen, the first public expression of disenchantment with nonviolence arose around the question of 'self-defense.' In a sense this is a false issue, for the right to defend one's home and one's person when attacked has been guaranteed through the ages by common law.”

“We can dream of an America, and a world, in which love and not money are civilization's bottom line.”

“War is the greatest plague that can afflict mankind... Any scourge is preferable to it.”

“There is nothing more tragic in all the world than to know right and not to do it.”

“Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle.”

“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.”