King begins:

Something is happening in Memphis; something is happening in our world. And you know, if I were standing at the beginning of time, with the possibility of taking a kind of general and panoramic view of the whole of human history up to now, and the Almighty said to me, “Martin Luther King, which age would you like to live in?” I would take my mental flight by Egypt and I would watch God’s children in their magnificent trek from the dark dungeons of Egypt through, or rather across the Red Sea, through the wilderness on toward the promised land. And in spite of its magnificence, I wouldn’t stop there.

I would move on by Greece and take my mind to Mount Olympus. And I would see Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Euripides and Aristophanes assembled around the Parthenon. And I would watch them around the Parthenon as they discussed the great and eternal issues of reality. But I wouldn’t stop there.

Here is the text of King’s last sermon, the night before he was assassinated. (There’s also an audio clip of a small part of the sermon.)

A photo of King preaching that Sunday in the Cathedral. March 31, 1968

Dr. King at National Cathedral

Obama was visibly moved by this information. This surely added to the convergence of King’s efforts and life and that of President Obama’s election.

I’ve got the text of King’s sermon in a book of his collected works. I’ll post it soon.