Martin Luther Quotes

If you could understand a single grain of wheat you would die of wonder.

What shall we do with...the Jews?...their homes also should be razed and destroyed.

Human reason is like a drunken man on horseback; set it up on one side, and it tumbles over on the other

Did I not tell you earlier that a Jew is such a noble, precious jewel that God and all the angels dance when he farts?

He who receives a sacrament does not perform a good work; he receives a benefit. In the mass we give Christ nothing; we only receive from Him.

He that has but one word of God before him, and out of that word cannot make a sermon, can never be a preacher.

Now just behold these miserable, blind, and senseless people.

Many of the ugly pages of American history have been obscured and forgotten

So preach that those who do not fall out with their sins may fall out with thee.

Where the battle rages, there the loyalty of the soldier is proved; and to be steady on all the battlefield besides, is mere flight and disgrace if he flinches at that point.

We are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs 'down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.'

There is nothing more tragic in all the world than to know right and not to do it.

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

We have a great dream. It started way back in 1776, and God grant that America will be true to her dream.

Something should remind us once more that the great things in this universe are things that we never see.

The purpose of direct action is to create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably open the door to negotiation.

Christ furnished the spirit and motivation while Gandhi furnished the method.

America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has come back marked 'insufficient funds.'

Every man of humane convictions must decide on the protest that best suits his convictions, but we must all protest.

Moral principles have lost their distinctiveness. For modern man, absolute right and absolute wrong are a matter of what the majority is doing.

Power is the ability to achieve purpose.

It will be one of the tragedies of Christian history if future historians record that at the height of the twentieth century the church was one of the greatest bulwarks of white supremacy.

Hatred and bitterness can never cure the disease of fear; only love can do that. Hatred paralyzes life; love harmonies it. Hatred darkens life; love illuminates it.

Whatever your life's work is, do it well.

Oh, the worst of all tragedies is not to die young, but to live until I am seventy five and yet not ever truly to have lived.

I refuse to accept the idea that man is mere flotsam and jetsam in the river of life, unable to influence the unfolding events which surround him.

We must move forward in the days ahead with audacious faith. The moral arc of the universe is long but it bends toward justice.

Don't allow anybody to make you feel that you're nobody.

There is a type of constructive nonviolent tension that is necessary for growth

But now I must affirm that it is just as wrong, or perhaps even more so, to use moral means to preserve immoral ends.

The softminded person always wants to freeze the moment and hold life in the gripping yoke of sameness.

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of this nation.

Before you finish eating breakfast in the morning, you've depended on more than half of the world.

And when you discover what you will be in your life, set out to do it as if God Almighty called you at this particular moment in history to do it. Don't just set out to do a good job.

History has thrust something upon me from which I cannot turn away.

I think that we must face the fact that in reality, you cannot have economic and political equality without having some form of social equality. I think this is inevitable.

If I sought to answer all of the criticisms that cross my desk, my secretaries would be engaged in little else in the course of the day, and I would have no time for constructive work.

Far from being disturbed by the presence of the church, the power structure of the average community is consoled by the church's often vocal sanction of things as they are.

If I were constantly worried about death, I couldn't function. After a while, if your life is more or less constantly in peril, you come to a point where you accept the possibility philosophically.

Whatever my doubts, however heavy the burden, I feel that I must accept the task of helping to make this nation and this world a better place to live in - for all men, black and white alike.

I don't think you can be in public life without being called bad names.

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

America, you must be born again!

Let us be practical and ask the question: How do we love our enemies?

Rioting is not revolutionary.

The oppressed must never allow the conscience of the oppressor to slumber. Religion reminds every man that he is his brother's keeper.

Violence often brings about momentary results.

Education must enable a man to become more efficient, to achieve with increasing facility the legitimate goals of his life.

Returning hate for hate multiplies hate.

Thus every matter, if it is to be done well, calls for the attention of the whole person.