Famous Quotes

Quotes by Martin Luther

• A genuine leader is not a searcher for consensus but a molder of consensus.
• A man who won't die for something is not fit to live.
• A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan.
• A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.
• All labor that uplifts humanity has dignity and importance and should be undertaken with painstaking excellence.
• All who call on God in true faith, earnestly from the heart, will certainly be heard, and will receive what they have asked and desired.
• An individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for the law.
• Anyone who is to find Christ must first find the church. How could anyone know where Christ is and what faith is in him unless he knew where his believers are?
• At the center of non-violence stands the principle of love.
• Be a sinner and sin strongly, but more strongly have faith and rejoice in Christ.
• Beautiful music is the art of the prophets that can calm the agitations of the soul it is one of the most magnificent and delightful presents God has given us.
• Blood alone moves the wheels of history.
• Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle. And so we must straighten our backs and work for our freedom. A man can't ride you unless your back is bent.
• Darkness cannot drive out darkness only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate only love can do that.
• Discrimination is a hellhound that gnaws at Negroes in every waking moment of their lives to remind them that the lie of their inferiority is accepted as truth in the society dominating them.
• Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.
• Every man must do two things alone he must do his own believing and his own dying.
• Everything that is done in the world is done by hope.
• Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times.
• Faith is permitting ourselves to be seized by the things we do not see.
• Faith is taking the first step even when you don't see the whole staircase.
• Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.
• For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver.
• For where God built a church, there the Devil would also build a chapel.
• Forgiveness is God's command.
• Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor it must be demanded by the oppressed.
• God writes the Gospel not in the Bible alone, but also on trees, and in the flowers and clouds and stars.
• Grant that I may not pray alone with the mouth help me that I may pray from the depths of my heart.
• Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must love our enemies - or else? The chain reaction of evil - hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars - must be broken, or else we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.
• History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people.
• I am more afraid of my own heart than of the pope and all his cardinals. I have within me the great pope, Self.
• I am not interested in power for power's sake, but I'm interested in power that is moral, that is right and that is good.
• I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.
• I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God. Amen.