The Measure of a Man

by Martin Luther King Jr.

They would avoid the extremes of a pessimistic naturalism and an optimistic humanism and seek to combine the truths of both.

“There are depths in man that go down to the lowest hell, and heights that reach the highest heaven, for are not both heaven and hell made out of him—everlasting miracle and mystery that he is?”

must be concerned with man’s physical well-being. It may

be true that man cannot live by bread alone, but the mere fact that Jesus added the “alone” means that man cannot live without bread.

any religion that professes to be concerned about the souls of men and is not concerned about the economic conditions that damn the soul, the social conditions that corrupt men, and the city governments that cripple them...

Some years ago a group of chemists who had a flair for statistics decided to work out the worth of man’s body in terms of the market values of that day. They got together and did a lot of work, and finally they came to this conclusion: The average man has enough fat in him to make about seven bars of soap, enough iron to make a medium-sized nail, enough sugar to fill a shaker, enough lime to whitewash a chicken coop, enough phosphorus for about 2200 match tips, and enough magnesium for a dose of magnesia. When all of this was added up in terms of the market values of that day it came to about 98 cents. Now, I guess, since the standards of living are a little higher today, you could get about $1.98 for the average man.

that comprehended them. This is what the biblical writers mean when they say that man is made in the image of God. Man has rational capacity; he has the unique ability to have fellowship with God. Man is a being of spirit.

“You strayed away to the far country of colonialism and imperialism. You have trampled over one billion six hundred million of your colored brothers in Africa and Asia. But, O Western Civilization, if you will come to yourself, rise up, and come back home, I will take you in.”

He should seek to do his job so well that the living, the dead, or the unborn could not do it better. No matter how small one thinks his life’s work is in terms of the norms of the world and the so-called big jobs, he must realize that it has cosmic significance if he is serving humanity and doing the will of God.

To carry this to one extreme, if it falls your lot to be a street-sweeper, sweep streets as Raphael painted pictures, sweep streets as Michelangelo carved marble, sweep streets as Beethoven composed music, sweep streets as 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.” In the words of Douglas Mallock: If you can’t be a highway, just be a trail; If you can’t be the sun, be a star, For it isn’t by size that you win or you fail— Be the best of whatever you are.

that the priest and the Levite asked was this: “If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?” Then the good Samaritan came by, and by the very nature of his concern reversed the question: “If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?”

I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the way our world is made.

Professor Sorokin of Harvard called a sensate civilization, believing that only those things which we can see and touch and to which we can apply our five senses have existence.