A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual death. – Martin Luther King,Jr., Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, 1967

If a man is called a streetsweeper, he should sweep streets even as Michelangelo painted, or Beethoven composed music, or Shakespeare wrote poetry. He should sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and Earth will pause to say, Here lived a great streetsweeper who did his job well. – Martin Luther King,Jr.

A second basic fact that characterizes nonviolence is that it does not seek to defeat or humiliate the opponent, but to win his friendship and understanding. – Martin Luther King,Jr., Stride Toward Freedom: The Montgomery Story, 1958

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. – Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy