Directions: Martin Luther King, Jr.’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail” includes many examples of figurative language meant to persuade people to take action. Read the lines from the letter and identify ONE type of figurative language (some excerpts may contain more than one), its meaning, its effect on mood and tone, and its effect on the audience. Over and over again I have found myself asking: "Who worships here? Who is their God? Where were their voices when the lips of Governor Barnett dripped with words of interposition and nullification? Where were their voices of support when tired, bruised, and weary Negro men and women decided to rise from the dark dungeons of complacency to the bright hills of creative protest?"

• Type of figurative language: Rhetorical Question
• Meaning of figurative language:
• Effect on tone and mood:
• Effect on the audience:

4. In those days the Church was not merely a thermometer that recorded the ideas and principles of popular opinion; it was a thermostat that transformed the mores of society.

• Type of figurative language:
• Meaning of figurative language:
• Effect on tone and mood:
• Effect on the audience:

5. It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in Hitler's Germany. But I am sure that, if I had lived in Germany during that time, I would have aided and comforted my Jewish brothers even though it was illegal.

• Type of figurative language:
• Meaning of figurative language:
• Effect on tone and mood:
• Effect on the audience: