Martin Luther King, Jr

A great American, a great Christian, a man used of God to bring a message to a broken people, though they knew it not. Misunderstood by many? Yes, then and now.

It seems this morning that I can hear God speaking. I can hear him speaking throughout the universe, saying, "Be still and know that I am God. And if you don't stop, if you don't straighten up, if you don't stop exploiting people, I'm going to rise up and break the backbone of your power. And your power will be no more!" And the power of Great Britain is no more. I looked at France. I looked at Britain. And I thought about the Britain that could boast, "The sun never sets on our great Empire." And I say now she had gone to the level that the sun hardly rises on the British Empire.

April 7, 1957

Martin Luther King, Jr, Papers Project