Inspirational Quotes By Martin Luther King Jr.

During the 1950s and ’60s, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. recognized the power of service to strengthen communities and achieve common goals.

This 2009 King Day of Service on January 19 is a day of interracial and intercultural sharing. Sparked by President-elect Obama and his call to service, it promises to be the biggest and best ever!

Martin Luther King Jr.'s most inspirational and memorable quotes:

All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.

Faith is taking the first step, even when you don’t see the whole staircase.

Hatred paralyzes life; love releases it. Hatred confuses life; love harmonizes it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. That is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.

In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.

Let no man pull you low enough to hate him.

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.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

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

Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.

We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.

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.

When you are right you cannot be too radical; when you are wrong, you cannot be too conservative.

All progress is precarious, and the solution of one problem brings us face to face with another problem.

Now, I say to you today my friends, even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow, I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream. I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal’. (Speech at Civil Rights March on Washington, August 28, 1963)

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

…And I’ve looked over, 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. So I’m happy tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. (Speech in Memphis, April 3, 1968, the day before Dr. King was assassinated)

The pictures used in this article are courtesy of Wikipedia.com.

See video clip of Dr. King’s last speech below.