Ten OTHER things Martin Luther King said

January 17, 2011 11:35 AM

What is needed is a realization that power without love is reckless and abusive, and love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice, and justice at its best is power correcting everything that stands against love. -MLK (SLYT)
posted by Pirate-Bartender-Zombie-Monkey (14 comments total)

I know I'm supposed to be listening to the words, but I can't look at that without obsessing over what happened to the other half of this guy's mustache.
posted by overhauser at 11:41 AM on January 17, 2011 [1 favorite]

"I come to this platform tonight to make a passionate plea to my beloved nation. This speech is not addressed to Hanoi or to the National Liberation Front. It is not addressed to China or to Russia."

-Martin Luther King.
posted by clavdivs at 11:55 AM on January 17, 2011

"We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked and dejected with a lost opportunity. The "tide in the affairs of men" does not remain at the flood; it ebbs. We may cry out deperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is deaf to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: "Too late." There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance or our neglect. "The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on..." We still have a choice today; nonviolent coexistence or violent co-annihilation."

-MLK
posted by clavdivs at 12:00 PM on January 17, 2011 [8 favorites]

.
posted by fingers_of_fire at 12:17 PM on January 17, 2011

Thanks, Pirate. It's so easy to think of MLK's contributions only in terms of the civil rights of black Americans, rather than the civil rights of all.

He's at the top of an extremely short list of people in modern history, in my opinion, that have this genuineness.

We could really use another of his ilk right about now.
posted by Revvy at 12:17 PM on January 17, 2011 [1 favorite]

Power without love is all we can reasonably expect from large institutions.

Love without power is Mrs. Zen and I snuggling in front of the fireplace.
posted by ZenMasterThis at 12:21 PM on January 17, 2011 [1 favorite]

The power of love is a curious thing.
posted by borborygmi at 12:28 PM on January 17, 2011 [3 favorites]

Makes a one man weep, makes another man sing.
posted by hincandenza at 12:46 PM on January 17, 2011 [3 favorites]

I haz a meme.
posted by sourwookie at 12:46 PM on January 17, 2011

One of my favorite lesser known quotes of Dr. King. It's simple and not overly original, but damn if the man didn't have a way with words.

"Even if it falls your lot to be a street sweeper, go on out and sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures; sweep streets like Handel and Beethoven composed music; sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry; sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say, "Here lived a great street sweeper who swept his job well...And when you do this, when you do this, you’ve mastered the length of life"
posted by billyfleetwood at 1:14 PM on January 17, 2011 [1 favorite]

"We still have a choice today; nonviolent coexistence or violent co-annihilation."

"We either live together, or we die together"
posted by SirOmega at 1:19 PM on January 17, 2011

Spiritual High.
posted by Sailormom at 1:30 PM on January 17, 2011

"The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice."
posted by kirkaracha at 1:39 PM on January 17, 2011 [1 favorite]

I've been to the mountaintop.

He was assassinated the following morning.
posted by kirkaracha at 1:42 PM on January 17, 2011