Top 500 Martin Luther King Jr. Quotes (2025 Update)
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201. “Was not Jesus an extremist in love? – “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, pray for them that despitefully use you.””

— Martin Luther King Jr.

202. “Never, never be afraid to do what’s right.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

203. “Nonviolence is not sterile passivity, but a powerful moral force which makes for social transformation.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

204. “One day we will learn that the heart can never be totally right if the head is totally wrong. Only through the bringing together of head and heart-intelligence and goodness-shall man rise to a fulfillment of his true nature.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

205. “Alienation is a form of living death. It is the acid of despair that dissolves society.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

206. “Forgiveness does not mean ignoring what has been done or putting a false label on an evil act. It means, rather, that the evil act no longer remains as a barrier to the relationship. Forgiveness is a catalyst creating the atmosphere necessary for a fresh start and a new beginning.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

207. “The group consisting of mother, father and child is the main educational agency of mankind.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

208. “True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that a system that produces beggars needs to be repaved. We are called to be the Good Samaritan, but after you lift so many people out of the ditch you start to ask, maybe the whole road to Jericho needs to be repaved.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

209. “The failures of the past must not be an excuse for the inaction of the present and the future.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

210. “Christianity has always insisted that the cross we bear always precedes the crown we wear.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

211. “A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law, or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

212. “In the process of gaining our rightful place, we must not be guilty of wrongful deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and hatred. We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

213. “But life at its best is a creative synthesis of opposites in fruitful harmony.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

214. “A social movement that only moves people is merely a revolt. A movement that changes both people and institutions is a revolution.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

215. “Nonviolence is absolute commitment to the way of love. Love is not emotional bash; it is not empty sentimentalism. It is the active outpouring of one’s whole being into the being of another.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

216. “From the prodigious hilltops of New Hampshire, let freedom ring. From the mighty mountains of New York, let freedom ring. From the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania, let freedom ring. But not only that: Let freedom ring from every hill and molehill of Mississippi.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

217. “He should sweep streets so well that all the host of heaven and earth will pause to say, ‘Here lives a great street-sweeper who did his job well’”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

218. “Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

219. “For all of us today, the battle is in our hands. The road ahead is not altogether a smooth one. There are no broad highways to lead us easily and inevitably to quick solutions. We must keep going.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

220. “Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself...”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

221. “I’ve decided to stick with love.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

222. “In Christ there is no East nor West.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

223. “The true neighbor will risk his position, his prestige, and even his life for the welfare of others.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

224. “If we are to go forward, we must go back and rediscover those precious values – that all reality hinges on moral foundations and that all reality has spiritual control.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

225. “Nothing pains some people more than having to think.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

226. “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.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

227. “I know that love is ultimately the only answer to mankind’s problems. And I’m going to talk about it everywhere I go. I know it isn’t popular to talk about it in some circles today. I’m not talking about emotional bosh when I talk about love, I’m talking about a strong, demanding love.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

228. “Call it democracy, or call it democratic socialism, but there must be a better distribution of wealth within this country for all God’s children.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

229. “Difficult and painful as it is, we must walk on in the days ahead with an audacious faith in the future.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

230. “The way of acquiescence leads to moral and spiritual suicide. The way of violence leads to bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers. But, the way of nonviolence leads to redemption and the creation of the beloved community.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

231. “So long as I do not firmly and irrevocably possess the right to vote I do not possess myself. I cannot make up my mind – it is made up for me. I cannot live as a democratic citizen, observing the laws I have helped to enact – I can only submit to the edict of others.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

232. “We stand in life at midnight; we are always at the threshold of a new dawn.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

233. “The body is God’s temple, but we are to worship God, not the temple.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

234. “To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

235. “We will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

236. “Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

237. “I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places will be made straight and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed and all flesh shall see it together.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

238. “There is little hope for us until we become tough-minded enough to break loose from the shackles of prejudice, half-truths, and down-right ignorance.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

239. “Darkness cannot be overcome with more darkness, only with light. Violence cannot be overcome with more violence, only with peace.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

240. “And I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people will get to the promised land.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

241. “Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

242. “A man dies when he refuses to stand up for that which is right.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

243. “The road to freedom is a difficult, hard road. It always makes for temporary setbacks.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

244. “I have a dream, that one day on the red hills of Georgia...”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

245. “The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

246. “Gandhi was inevitable. If humanity is to progress, Gandhi is inescapable. He lived, thought and acted, inspired by the vision of humanity evolving toward a world of peace and harmony. We may ignore Gandhi at our own risk.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

247. “The strong man is the man who can stand up for his rights and not hit back.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

248. “When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds and our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, we will know that we are living in the creative turmoil of a genuine civilization struggling to be born.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.

249. “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 Jr.

250. “My country, ’tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim’s pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring.”

— Martin Luther King Jr.