Learning Through Words

Today is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, so via MLK Online, I thought I would share some of my favorite Martin Luther King, Jr. quotes. Let’s honor his memory by keeping his words alive:

• “A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death.”

- Martin Luther King, Jr., Where Do We Go From Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967.

• “Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time: the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. 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., Nobel Prize acceptance speech, Stockholm, Sweden, December 11, 1964.

• “Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that. Hate multiplies hate, violence multiplies violence, and toughness multiplies toughness in a descending spiral of destruction….The chain reaction of evil–hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars–must be broken, or we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.”

- Martin Luther King, Jr., Strength To Love, 1963.

• “We must combine the toughness of the serpent and the softness of the dove, a tough mind and a tender heart.”

- Martin Luther King, Jr., Strength to Love, 1963.

• “Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice. Justice at its best is love correcting everything that stands against love.”

- Martin Luther King, Jr., Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967.