Please be peaceful. We believe in law and order. We are not advocating violence, I want you to love your enemies... for what we are doing is right, what we are doing is just -- and God is with us.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of non-violence and love, even towards adversaries, based on a moral conviction of justice.
In this quote, Martin Luther King, Jr. calls for peaceful resistance while asserting that love for enemies is a fundamental principle in the pursuit of justice. He underscores the belief that righteous actions are supported by a higher moral authority and encourages individuals to remain steadfast in their commitment to non-violence despite the challenges they face.
In practice
In a speech advocating for peaceful protests, this quote can emphasize the importance of non-violent resistance.
This business of burning human beings with napalm, of filling our nation's homes with orphans and widows, of injecting poisonous drugs of hate into veins of peoples normally humane, of sending men home from dark and bloody battlefields physically handicapped and psychologically deranged, cannot be reconciled with wisdom, justice and love.
Music is the best consolation for a despaired man
We must meet the forces of hate with the power of love.
We may have all come on different ships, but we're in the same boat now.
Israel... is one of the great outpost of democracy in the world
One of the greatest casualties of the war in Vietnam is the Great Society... shot down on the battlefield of Vietnam.
Cowardice, as distinguished from panic, is almost always simply a lack of ability to suspend the functioning of the imagination.
There's something wrong in a nation where six million black men are not allowed to vote because they were convicted of felonies. They've paid their dues to society, but yet their right to vote is not reinstated.
All that is necessary for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing as they must if they believe they can do nothing. There is nothing worse because the council of despair is declaration of irresponsibility; it is Pilate washing his hands.
His whole body shakes with the strain as he tries to lift something he knows he can't lift, something everybody knows he can't lift. But, for just a second, when we hear the cement grind at our feet, we think, by golly, he might do it.
You have plenty of courage, I am sure," answered Oz. "All you need is confidence in yourself. There is no living thing that is not afraid when it faces danger. The true courage is in facing danger when you are afraid, and that kind of courage you have in plenty.
If we die, we want people to accept it. We are in a risky business, and we hope that if anything happens to us, it will not delay the program. The conquest of space is worth the risk of life.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.