“most people never learn the art of transmuting their strongest emotions into dreams of a constructive nature.”

“At its deepest level, prayer is fellowship with God: enjoying His company, waiting upon His will, thanking Him for His mercies . . . listening in the silence for what He has to say to us.”

“The future depends on what we do in the present.”

“Thomas Jefferson asked himself “In what country on earth would you rather live ” He first answered “Certainly in my own where are all my friends my relations and the earliest and sweetest affections and recollections of my life.” But he continued “which would be your second choice ” His answer “France.”

“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.”

“Compassion, however, should mean providing a mechanism to escape poverty rather than simply maintaining people in an impoverished state by supplying handouts. By doing this we give them an opportunity to elevate their personal situations, which eventually decreases our need to take care of them and empowers them to be able to exercise compassion toward others.”

“Anything can be a bucket if you try hard enough and believe.”

“TRULY, "thoughts are things," and powerful things at that, when they are mixed with definiteness of purpose, persistence, and a BURNING DESIRE for their translation into riches, or other material objects.

“Life is a linear equation in which you can't cross multiply! If you think you can do it, you can do it. If you think you can't do it, you can't do it. It's a simple formula!”

“Free at last, Free at last, Thank God almighty we are free at last.”

“I will tell you that there have been no failures in my life. I don't want to sound like some metaphysical queen,but there have been no failures. There have been some tremendous lessons.”

“Don't complain. It's just a way of explaining your pains for no gains. Wake up to your calling... Wear a positive move and say your desires to God!”

“The world is in greater peril from those who tolerate or encourage evil than from those who actually commit it.”

“The poorest person on earth is not the person who has no job, no cars, no money and no house. The poorest person is the one who has no vision. Visionlessness is poverty in disguise.”

“Libraries remind us that truth isn't about who yells the loudest, but who has the right information. Because even as we're the most religious of people, America's innovative genius has always been preserved because we also have a deep faith in facts.”