A mass movement exercising nonviolence and demonstrating power under discipline should convince the white community that as such a movement attained strength, its power would be used creatively and not for revenge.

Only through our adherence to nonviolence- which also means love in its strong and commanding sense -will the fear in the white community be mitigated.

To believe in nonviolence does not mean that violence will not be inflicted upon you. The believer in nonviolence is the person who will willingly allow himself to be the victim of violence but will never inflict violence upon another.

Nonviolence has also meant that my people in the agonizing struggles of recent years have taken suffering upon themselves instead of inflicting it on others.

It is my great hope that as the Negro plunges deeper into the quest for freedom, he will plunge deeper into the philosophy of non-violence. As a race we must work passionately and unrelentingly for first-class citizenship, but we must never use second class methods to gain it.

Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit.