Dr. King Matters

A legacy comes from both actions and words. Here are a few of the words that contribute to the powerful legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King...

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. 

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.

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.

All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.

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.

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

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

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

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.

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

Philanthropy is commendable, but it must not cause the philanthropist to overlook the circumstances of economic injustice which make philanthropy necessary.

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.

The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and to think critically. Intelligence plus character - that is the goal of true education.

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.

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.