Skip to content

Men Quotes by Martin Luther King, Jr

180 Men quotes by Martin Luther King, Jr

All Men quotes Martin Luther King, Jr’s page

Martin Luther King Jr. describes how force creates more force and hate breeds hate, a downward spiral that harms everyone. He speaks of a future where the American dream of equal opportunity becomes real, and of a universal brotherhood linking all lives. He warns that a nation raising soft‑minded men buys its own spiritual death, and that a man without a cause worth dying for lacks a right to live.

Rate this collection: ★ ★ ★ ★ ★ No ratings yet

It's not how long a man lives, but how well he uses the time allotted him.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

We live in a world of guided missiles and misguided men.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Music is the best consolation for a despaired man

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

My soul is too glad and too great to be at heart the enemy of any man

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

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

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Love is understanding, redemptive goodwill for all men, so that you love everybody.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

To deny a man a job is to say that a man has no right to exist.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

The most dangerous criminal may be the man gifted with reason, but with no morals.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

I am convinced that...in the struggle for righteousness man has cosmic companionship.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

If a man hasn't found anything worth dying for, he hasn't anything worth living for.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Man is man because he is free to operate within the framework of his destiny. He is free to deliberate, to make…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

I cannot forget that the Nobel Prize for Peace was also a commission - a commission to work harder than I had…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

I may be crucified for my beliefs and, if I am, you can say, "He died to make men free.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

To have peace in the world, men & nations must embrace the nonviolent assertion that ends and means must cohere.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

‎It is a cruel injustice to tell a bootless man to pull himself up by his bootstraps.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

The belief that God will do everything for man is as untenable as the belief that man can do everything for himself.…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

In every age and every generation, men have envisioned a promised land. Some may have envisioned it with the wrong ideology, with…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

I may not be the man I want to be; I may not be the man I ought to be; I may…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

At the heart of all that civilization has meant and developed is 'community' - the mutually cooperative and voluntary venture of man…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Any religion that professes to be concerned about the souls of men and is not concerned about the slums that damn them,…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

We were all involved in the death of John Kennedy. We tolerated hate; we tolerated the sick stimulation of violence in all…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

In our society it is murder, psychologically, to deprive a man of a job or an income. You are in substance saying…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Courageous men never lose the zest for living even though their life situation is zestless; cowardly men, overwhelmed by the uncertainties of…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

On the one hand we are called to play the good Samaritan on life's roadside; but that will be only an initial…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

The use of violence in our struggle would be both impractical and immoral. To meet hate with retaliatory hate would do nothing…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Most of these people will never make the headlines and their names will not appear in Who's Who. Yet when years have…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

The potential beauty of human life is constantly made ugly by man's ever recurring song of retaliation. The oceans of history are…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

The strong man holds in a living blend strongly marked opposites. The idealists are not usually realistic, and the realists are not…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Violence never really deals with the basic evil of the situation. Violence may murder the murderer, but it doesn’t murder murder. Violence…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

There may come a time when it will be possible for you to humiliate your worst enemy or even to defeat him,…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Every man [human being] is an heir to a legacy of dignity and worth

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Our age is one of guided missiles and unguided men.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

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

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

When evil men burn and bomb, good men must build and bind.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Every man is somebody because he is a child of God.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

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

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

I would rather be a man of conviction than a man of conformity

Martin Luther King, Jr

Image

Other authors on Men

More by Martin Luther King, Jr

The strong man holds in a living blend strongly marked opposites.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Our nation was born in genocide when it embraced the doctrine that the original American, the Indian, was an inferior race. ... We are…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Somewhere somebody must have some sense. Men must see that force begets force, hate begets hate, toughness begets toughness. And it is all a…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Every genuine expression of love grows out of a consistent and total surrender to God.

Martin Luther King, Jr

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…

Martin Luther King, Jr

I’ve been to the Mountaintop

Martin Luther King, Jr

The supreme task is to organize and unite people so that their anger becomes a transforming force.

Martin Luther King, Jr

The great issue of life is to harness the drum major instinct.

Martin Luther King, Jr

Somebody must have sense enough and morality enough to cut off the chain of hate and the chain of evil in the universe. And…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Darkness is only driven out with light, not more darkness.

Martin Luther King, Jr

What seems so necessary today may not even be desirable tomorrow.

Martin Luther King, Jr

The Negro cannot win the respect of his oppressor by acquiescing; he merely increases the oppressor's arrogance and contempt.

Martin Luther King, Jr

The majority of the Negroes who took part in the year-long boycott of Montgomery's buses were poor and untutored; but they understood the essence…

Martin Luther King, Jr

Whenever you are engaged in work that serves humanity and is for the building of humanity, it has dignity and it has worth,

Martin Luther King, Jr

I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and oppression, will…

Martin Luther King, Jr