It all boils down to the fact that we must never allow ourselves to become satisfied with unattained goals. We must always maintain a kind of divine discontent.

Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice.

This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism.

One of the great tragedies of life is that men seldom bridge the gulf between practice and profession, between doing and saying.

The great majority of Americans are suspended between these opposing attitudes. They are uneasy with injustice but unwilling yet to pay a significant price to eradicate it.

If physical death is the price that I must pay to free my white brothers and sisters from a permanent death of the spirit, then nothing can be more redemptive.

One day we shall win freedom, but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory.