“Something is happening in Memphis; something is happening in our world. And you know, if I were standing at the beginning of time, with the possibility of taking a kind of general and panoramic view of the whole of human history up to now, and the Almighty said to me, "Martin Luther King, which age would you like to live in?" I would take my mental flight by Egypt and I would watch God's children in their magnificent trek from the dark dungeons of Egypt through, or rather across the Red Sea, through the wilderness on toward the promised land. And in spite of its magnificence, I wouldn't stop there. I would move on by Greece and take my mind to Mount Olympus. And I would see Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides and Aristophanes assembled around the Parthenon. And I would watch them around the Parthenon as they discussed the great and eternal issues of reality. But I wouldn't stop there. I would go on, even to the great heyday of the Roman Empire. And I would see developments around there, through various emperors and leaders. But I wouldn't stop there. I would even come up to the day of the Renaissance, and get a quick picture of all that the Renaissance did for the cultural and aesthetic life of man. But I wouldn't stop there. I would even go by the way that the man for whom I am named had his habitat. And I would watch Martin Luther as he tacked his ninety-five theses on the door at the church of Wittenberg. But I wouldn't stop there. I would come on up even to 1863, and watch a vacillating President by the name of Abraham Lincoln finally come to the conclusion that he had to sign the Emancipation Proclamation. But I wouldn't stop there. I would even come up to the early thirties, and see a man grappling with the problems of the bankruptcy of his nation. And come with an eloquent cry that we have nothing to fear but "fear itself." But I wouldn't stop there.”

“If we are to depend on prayer during tough times, we should be people of prayer before the crisis hits.”

“I have received no assurance that anything we can do will eradicate suffering. I think the best results are obtained by people who work quietly away at limited objectives, such as the abolition of the slave trade, or prison reform, or factory acts, or tuberculosis, not by those who think they can achieve universal justice, or health, or peace. I think the art of life consists in tackling each immediate evil as well as we can.”

“The single best and easiest thing you can do for your health is to recalibrate your taste buds and learn to enjoy pure clean water.”

“There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered.”

“If your spirit were healed, you would still have the same spirit, too, except it would just be healed. But no, blessed be God, Second Corinthians 5:17 tells us, “Therefore if any man be in Christ, he is a NEW creature: old things are passed away; behold, all things are become NEW.” Not half of them—all of them. Every bit of them.”

“The mark of Friendship is not that help will be given when the pinch comes (of course it will) but that, having been given, it makes no difference at all.”

“You can make anything by writing.”

“We will always remember. We will always be proud. We will always be prepared, so we will always be free.”

“Living to create an earthly legacy is a short-sighted goal.”

“Christ warned His followers that to believe in Him would not make them popular, and that they should be prepared to face affliction for His sake.”

“Pretence about anything sometimes deceives the wisest and shrewdest man, but, however cunningly it is hidden, a child of the meanest capacity feels it and is repelled by it.”

“I never worry because I know who I am and I know Whose I am.” 

“If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you have time to do it over?”

“Ninety-five percent of the difficulties you will experience as a Christian can be traced to a lack of Bible study and reading.”