“If we do not act, we shall surely be dragged down the long, dark, and shameful corridors of time reserved for those who possess power without compassion, might without morality, and strength without sight.”

“we shall match your capacity to inflict suffering by our capacity to endure suffering. We will meet your physical force with soul force. Do to us what you will. And we shall continue to love you.”

“Faith is taking the first step even when you can't see the whole staircase.”

“There comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular, but he must take it because conscience tells him it is right.”

“The limitation of riots, moral questions aside, is that they cannot win, and their participants know it.”

“We are going to win our freedom because both the sacred heritage of our nation and the eternal will of the Almighty God are embodied in our echoing demands. So however difficult it is during this period, however difficult it is to continue to live with the agony and the continued existence of racism, however difficult it is to live amidst the constant hurt, the constant insult and the constant disrespect, I can still sing we shall overcome. We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends towards justice. We shall overcome because Carlisle is right. "No lie can live forever." We shall overcome because William Cullen Bryant is right. "Truth crushed to earth will rise again." We shall overcome because James Russell Lowell is right. "Truth forever on the scaffold, wrong forever on the throne."   Yet that scaffold sways the future. We shall overcome because the Bible is right.  "You shall reap what you sow." With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to speed up the day when all of God's children all over this nation - black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old negro spiritual, "Free at Last, Free at Last, Thank God Almighty, We are Free At Last.”

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

“I have a dream. I have a dream that one day, people will be judged by the content of their character, not by the color of their skin.”

“Law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice.”

“The time is always right to do what is right.”

“I have decided to stick to love...Hate is too great a burden to bear.”

“Carve a tunnel of hope through a dark mountain of disappointment”

“The only weapon that we have in our hands this evening is the weapon of protest. That's all.”

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

“One day we will learn that the heart can never be totally right when the head is totally wrong”