100 Martin Luther King Quotes | Life | Education

Leaders Quotes | Martin Luther King

Born: 15 January 1929
Died: 4 April 1968
Country: United States
1.Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.
- Martin Luther King

2.Darkness cannot drive out darkness: only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
- Martin Luther King

3. I have decided to stick to love...Hate is too great a burden to bear.
- Martin Luther King

4. In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.
- Martin Luther King

5. We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.
- Martin Luther King

6. Those who are not looking for happiness are the most likely to find it, because those who are searching forget that the surest way to be happy is to seek happiness for others.
- Martin Luther King

7. If a man is called to be a street sweeper, he should sweep streets even as a Michaelangelo 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 street sweeper who did his job well.
- Martin Luther King

8. Forgiveness is not an occasional act, it is a constant attitude.
- Martin Luther King

9. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
- Martin Luther King

10. A man who won't die for something is not fit to live.
- Martin Luther King

11. No one really knows why they are alive until they know what they'd die for.
- Martin Luther King

12. 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.
- Martin Luther King

13. 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.
- Martin Luther King

14. Intelligence plus character-that is the goal of true education.
- Martin Luther King

15. 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.
- Martin Luther King

16. Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.
- Martin Luther King

17. There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.
- Martin Luther King

18. Let no man pull you so low as to hate him.
- Martin Luther King

19. But I know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough can you see the stars.
- Martin Luther King

20. If you can't fly then run, if you can't run then walk, if you can't walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.
- Martin Luther King

21. Faith is taking the first step even when you can't see the whole staircase.
- Martin Luther King

22. Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal.
- Martin Luther King

23. 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.
- Martin Luther King

24. There comes a time when silence is betrayal.
- Martin Luther King

25. 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.
- Martin Luther King

26. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred.
- Martin Luther King

27. True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.
- Martin Luther King

28. An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity.
- Martin Luther King

29. Free at last, Free at last, Thank God almighty we are free at last.
- Martin Luther King

30. 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?
- Martin Luther King

31. Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy to a friend.
- Martin Luther King

32. The choice is not between violence and nonviolence but between nonviolence and nonexistence.
- Martin Luther King

33. If I cannot do great things, I can do small things in a great way.
- Martin Luther King

34. Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.
- Martin Luther King

35. Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.
- Martin Luther King

36. Life's most persistent and urgent question is, 'What are you doing for others?
- Martin Luther King

37. There can be no deep disappointment where there is not deep love.
- Martin Luther King

38. Not only will we have to repent for the sins of bad people; but we also will have to repent for the appalling silence of good people.
- Martin Luther King

39. A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.
- Martin Luther King

40. Wars are poor chisels for carving out peaceful tomorrows.
- Martin Luther King

41. One has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.
- Martin Luther King

42. No person has the right to rain on your dreams.
- Martin Luther King

43. 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

44. Science investigates; religion interprets. Science gives man knowledge, which is power; religion gives man wisdom, which is control. Science deals mainly with facts; religion deals mainly with values. The two are not rivals.
- Martin Luther King

45. As my sufferings mounted I soon realized that there were two ways in which I could respond to my situation -- either to react with bitterness or seek to transform the suffering into a creative force. I decided to follow to latter.
- Martin Luther King

46. We must live together as brothers or perish together as fools.

- Martin Luther King

47. I have a dream that one day little black boys and girls will be holding hands with little white boys and girls.
- Martin Luther King

48. A right delayed is a right denied.
- Martin Luther King

49. It is cheerful to God when you rejoice or laugh from the bottom of your heart.
- Martin Luther King

50. The question is not if we will be extremists, but what kind of extremists we will be. The nation and the world are in dire need of creative extremists.
- Martin Luther King

51. Quietly endure, silently suffer and patiently wait.
- Martin Luther King

52. Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.
- Martin Luther King

53. 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

54. We may have all come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now.
- Martin Luther King

55. Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable... Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.
- Martin Luther King

56. Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.
- Martin Luther King

57. Those who love peace must learn to organize as effectively as those who love war.
- Martin Luther King

58. It’s all right to tell a man to lift himself by his own bootstraps, but it is cruel jest to say to a bootless man that he ought to lift himself by his own bootstraps.
- Martin Luther King

59. 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.
- Martin Luther King

60. The greatest purveyor of violence in the world : My own Government, I can not be Silent.
- Martin Luther King

61. We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history, 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.
- Martin Luther King

62. The day we see the truth and cease to speak is the day we begin to die.
- Martin Luther King

63. Not everybody can be famous but everybody can be great, because greatness is determined by service.
- Martin Luther King

64. We have flown the air like birds and swum the sea like fishes, but have yet to learn the simple act of walking the earth like brothers.
- Martin Luther King

65. No work is insignificant. All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.
- Martin Luther King

66. Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane.
- Martin Luther King

67. 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.
- Martin Luther King

68. Lightning makes no sound until it strikes.
- Martin Luther King

69. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.
- Martin Luther King

70. One of the great liabilities of history is that all too many people fail to remain awake through great periods of social change. Every society has its protectors of status quo and its fraternities of the indifferent who are notorious for sleeping through revolutions. 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.
- Martin Luther King

71. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.
- Martin Luther King

72. Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men.
- Martin Luther King

73. Power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love.
- Martin Luther King

74. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars... Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
- Martin Luther King

75. The major problem of life is learning how to handle the costly interruptions. The door that slams shut, the plan that got sidetracked, the marriage that failed. Or that lovely poem that didn't get written because someone knocked on the door.
- Martin Luther King

76. What affects one in a major way, affects all in a minor way.

- Martin Luther King

77. Be The Peace You Wish To See In The World!
- Martin Luther King

78. One day the absurdity of the almost universal human belief in the slavery of other animals will be palpable. We shall then have discovered our souls and become worthier of sharing this planet with them.
- Martin Luther King

79. There is nothing more majestic than the determined courage of individuals willing to suffer and sacrifice for their freedom and dignity.
- Martin Luther King

80. We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.
- Martin Luther King

81. Use me, God. Show me how to take who I am, who I want to be, and what I can do, and use it for a purpose greater than myself.
- Martin Luther King

82. We must remember that intelligence is not enough. Intelligence plus character-that is the goal of true education. The complete education gives one not only power of concentration, but worthy objectives upon which to concentrate.
- Martin Luther King

83. One's dignity may be assaulted, vandalized, cruelly mocked, but it an never be taken away unless it is surrendered.
- Martin Luther King

84. Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will.
- Martin Luther King

85. We must learn that passively to accept an unjust system is to cooperate with that system, and thereby to become a participant in its evil.
- Martin Luther King

86. One day we will learn that the heart can never be totally right when the head is totally wrong.
- Martin Luther King

87. Whenever men and women straighten their backs up, they are going somewhere, because a man can't ride your back unless it is bent.
- Martin Luther King

88. When we look at modern man, we have to face the fact...that modern man suffers from a kind of poverty of the spirit, which stands in glaring contrast to his scientific and technological abundance; We've learned to fly the air like birds, we've learned to swim the seas like fish, and yet we haven't learned to walk the Earth as brothers and sisters.
- Martin Luther King

89. Morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated. Judicial decrees may not change the heart, but they can restrain the heartless.
- Martin Luther King

90. Take the first step in faith. You don't have to see the whole staircase, just take the first step.
- Martin Luther King

91. If we do an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, we will be a blind and toothless nation.
- Martin Luther King

92. It does not matter how long you live, but how well you do it.
- Martin Luther King

93. 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.
- Martin Luther King

94. The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.

- Martin Luther King

95. True peace is not merely the absence of tension: it is the presence of justice.

- Martin Luther King

96. Occasionally in life there are those moments of unutterable fulfillment which cannot be completely explained by those symbols called words. Their meanings can only be articulated by the inaudible language of the heart.

- Martin Luther King

97. I became convinced that noncooperation with evil is as much a moral obligation as is cooperation with good.

- Martin Luther King

98. It really boils down to this: that all life is interrelated. We are all caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tired into a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one destiny, affects all indirectly.

- Martin Luther King

99. It may be true that the law cannot make a man love me, but it can stop him from lynching me, and I think that's pretty important.

- Martin Luther King

100. Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man's sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.

- Martin Luther King