Famous Quotations / Quotes
Famous Quotes about Liberty
 

 
Famous quotes, quotations, sayings, phrases, idioms, proverbs, and axioms about Liberty and the Responsibility that comes with it. 
 


The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations

A classic since 1953 with over 20,000 quotes from over 3,000 authors.


Famous Last Words

Apt Observations, Pleas, Curses, Benedictions, Sour Notes, Bons Mots, and Insights from People on the Brink of Departure


Stretch Your Wings

Famous Black Quotations for the Young


American Quotations

An exhaustive collection of profound quotes from the founding fathers, presidents, statesmen, scientists, constitutions, court decisions


The Oxford Dictionary of Humorous Quotations


Last Words of Saints and Sinners

700 Final Quotes from the Famous, the Infamous, and the Inspiring Figures of History


America's God and Country: Encyclopedia of Quotations

Contains over 2,100 profound quotations from founding fathers, presidents, constitutions, court decisions and more


The Law

This 1850 classic is an absolute must read for anyone interested in law, justice, truth, or liberty. A most compelling and revolutionary look at The Law.


Bartlett's Familiar Quotations

A Collection of Passages, Phrases, and Proverbs Traced to Their Sources in Ancient and Modern Literature (17th Edition)


The Stupidest Things Ever Said by Politicians

Rise up, America -- and laugh out loud at the greatest gaffes that no spin doctor could possibly fix!


The 776 Even Stupider Things Ever Said

Another great collection of stupidity


Quotable Quotes

Wit and Wisdom for All Occasions from America's Most Popular Magazine


The Most Brilliant Thoughts of All Time

You don't have to be a genius to sound like one. Here's a collection of the most profound and provocative wit and wisdom in the English language in two lines or less.


2,715 One-Line Quotations for Speakers, Writers & Raconteurs

Invaluable sampler of witticisms, epigrams, sayings, bon mots, platitudes and insights chosen for their brevity and pithiness.


Phillips' Book of Great Thoughts Funny Sayings

A stupendous collection of quotes, quips, epigrams, witticisms, and humorous comments for personal enjoyment and ready reference.


Quick Quips and Quotes; 532 Things I Wish I Had Said

Quick Quips and Quotes is the Ultimate Collection of one liners.


Bartlett's Book of Anecdotes

The ultimate anthology of anecdotes, now revised with over 700 new entries.


Quotations for Public Speakers

A Historical, Literary, and Political Anthology


Liberty - The American Revolution

This compelling series traces the events leading up to the war and America's fight for freedom.


Founding Fathers

The story of how these disparate characters fomented rebellion in the colonies, formed the Continental Congress, fought the Revolutionary War, and wrote the Constitution


Libertarianism: A Primer

David Boaz, director of the Cato Institute, has written a simple introduction to Libertarianism inteneded to appeal to disgruntled Democrats and Republicans everywhere.


The Libertarian Reader

Classic and Contemporary Writings from Lao-Tzu to Milton Friedman


Thomas Paine: Collected Writings

All the classics: Common Sense / The Crisis / Rights of Man / The Age of Reason / Pamphlets, Articles, and Letters

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Show details for [<a href="/quotes_about/sin">Sin Quotes</a>]Sin Quotes
Show details for [<a href="/quotes_about/skepticism">Skepticism Quotes</a>]Skepticism Quotes
Show details for [<a href="/quotes_about/slander">Slander Quotes</a>]Slander Quotes
Hide details for [<a href="/quotes_about/slavery">Slavery Quotes</a>]Slavery Quotes
A Bill Concerning SlavesNo slaves shall keep any arms whatever, nor pass, unless with written orders from his master or employer, or in his company, with arms from one place to another.
Samuel AdamsA general dissolution of the principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy.... While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but once they lose their virtue, they will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader.... If virtue and knowledge are diffused among the people, they will never be enslaved. This will be their great security.
Samuel AdamsIf men, through fear, fraud, or mistake, should in terms renounce or give up any natural right, the eternal law of reason and the grand end of society would absolutely vacate such renunciation. The right to freedom being the gift of Almighty God, it is not in the power of man to alienate this gift and voluntarily become a slave.
Joseph AddisonA day, an hour, of virtuous liberty Is worth a whole eternity in bondage.
AeschylusDestiny waits alike for the free man as well as for him enslaved by another's might.
AesopBetter to starve free than be a fat slave.
AesopAny excuse will serve a tyrant.
AesopWhile I see many hoof marks going in, I see none coming out. It is easier to get into the enemy's toils than out again.
Herbert Sebastien AgarThe truth that makes men free is for the most part the truth which men prefer not to hear.
American Mercury MagazineThe invisible Money Power is working to control and enslave mankind. It financed Communism, Fascism, Marxism, Zionism and Socialism. All of these are directed to making the United States a member of World Government.
Mikhail A. BakuninIntellectual slavery, of whatever nature it may be, will always have as a natural result both political and social slavery.
Frederic BastiatA Fatal Tendency of Mankind. Self-preservation and self-development are common aspirations among all people. And if everyone enjoyed the unrestricted use of his faculties and the free disposition of the fruits of his labor, social progress would be ceaseless, uninterrupted, and unfailing. But there is also another tendency that is common among people. When they can, they wish to live and prosper at the expense of others. This is no rash accusation. Nor does it come from a gloomy and uncharitable spirit. The annals of history bear witness to the truth of it: the incessant wars, mass migrations, religious persecutions, universal slavery, dishonesty in commerce, and monopolies. This fatal desire has its origin in the very nature of man -- in that primitive, universal, and insuppressible instinct that impels him to satisfy his desires with the least possible pain.
Rev. Henry Ward BeecherLiberty is the soul's right to breathe and, when it cannot take a long breath, laws are girdled too tight.
Isaiah BerlinInjustice, poverty, slavery, ignorance -- these may be cured by reform or revolution. But men do not live only by fighting evils. They live by positive goals, individual and collective, a vast variety of them, seldom predictable, at times incompatible.
Lawana BlackwellPatterning your life around other's opinions is nothing more than slavery.
William BradfordIf all were to share alike, and all were to do alike, then all were on an equality throughout, and one was as good as another; and so, if it did not actually abolish those very relations which God himself has set among men, it did at least greatly diminish the mutual respect that is so important should be preserved amongst them. Let none argue that this is due to human failing, rather than to this communistic plan of life in itself....
William BradfordThe experience that was had in ... the taking away of private property, and the possession of it in community, by a commonwealth ... was found to breed much confusion and discontent; and retard much employment which would have been to the general benefit.... For the young men that were most able and fit for labor and service objected that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men's wives and children, without any recompense.... The strong man or the resourceful man had no more share of food, clothes, etc., than the weak man who was not able to do a quarter the other could; this was thought injustice. The aged and graver men, who were ranked and equalized in labor, food, clothes, etc., with the meaner and younger ones, thought it some indignity and disrespect to them.
Robert BrowningSo free we seem, so fettered fast we are.
John "Birdman" BryantIf you are afraid to speak against tyranny, then you are already a slave.
Sir Richard Francis BurtonThe dearest ambition of a slave is not liberty, but to have a slave of his own.
Samuel ButlerHe that complies against his will, Is of his own opinion still.
Lord ByronHereditary bondsmen! Know ye not
Who would be free themselves must strike the blow?
Candidus[I]f the public are bound to yield obedience to laws to which they cannot give their approbation, they are slaves to those who make such laws and enforce them.
Joseph H. ChoateThe Act of Congress which we are impugning before you is communistic in its purposes and tendencies, and is defended here upon principles as communistic, socialistic - what shall I call them - populistic as ever have been
addressed to any political assembly in the world.
Sir Winston ChurchillStill, if you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not so costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance for survival. There may be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no chance of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.
Marcus Tullius CiceroLiberty is rendered even more precious by the recollection of servitude.
Henry ClayAn oppressed people are authorized, whenever they can, to rise and break their fetters.
William Kingdon CliffordThere is one thing in the world more wicked than the desire to command, and that is the will to obey.
Henry Steele CommagerCensorship always defeats its own purpose, for it creates, in the end, the kind of society that is incapable of exercising real discretion... In the long run it will create a generation incapable of appreciating the difference between independence of thought and subservience.
William CowperBut slaves that once conceive the glowing thought\\
Of freedom, in that hope itself possess\\
All that the contest calls for; spirit, strength,\\
The scorn of danger, and united hearts,\\
The surest presage of the good they seek.
William CowperNo, Freedom has a thousand charms to show\\
That slaves, howe'er contented, never know.
William CowperHe is the freeman whom the truth makes free,
And all are slaves besides.
William CowperFreedom has a thousand charms to show,\\
That slaves, howe'er contented, never know.
John Philpot CurranIt is the common fate of the indolent to see their rights become prey to the active. The conditions upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime, and the punishment of his guilt.
Mark Da CunhaIn principle, there are only two fundamental political viewpoints.
That is, two contradictory ends of the 'political spectrum.'
Those two principles are freedom and slavery.
Estienne de la BoétieIt is incredible how as soon as a people become subject, it promptly falls into such complete forgetfulness of its freedom that it can hardly be roused to the point of regaining it, obeying so easily and willingly that one is led to say that this people has not so much lost its liberty as won its enslavement.
Louis Charles Alfred de MussetFew persons enjoy real liberty; we are all slaves to ideas or habits.
Antoine De Saint-ExuperyTrue, it is evil that a single man should crush the herd, but see not there the worse form of slavery, which is when the herd crushes out the man.
Alexis de TocquevilleIf there ever are great revolutions there,
they will be caused by the presence of the blacks upon American soil.
That is to say, it will not be the equality of social conditions
but rather their inequality which may give rise thereto.
Alexis de TocquevilleAmericans are so enamored of equality, they would rather be equal in slavery than unequal in freedom.
Alexis de Tocqueville[Some people] have a depraved taste for equality, which impels the weak to lower the powerful to their own level, and reduces men to prefer equality in slavery to inequality with freedom. I believe that it is easier to establish an absolute and despotic government amongst a people in which the conditions of society are equal, than amongst any other; and I think that, if such a government were once established amongst such a people, it would not only oppress men, but would eventually strip each of them of several of the highest qualities of humanity. Despotism, therefore, appears to me peculiarly to be dreaded in democratic times.
Alexis de TocquevilleThe man who asks of freedom anything other than itself is born to be a slave.
DemosthenesBeware lest in your anxiety to avoid war you obtain a master.
Fyodor DostoyevskyEvery member of the society spies on the rest, and it is his duty to inform against them. All are slaves and equal in their slavery... The great thing about it is equality... Slaves are bound to be equal.
Frederick DouglassNo man can put a chain about the ankle of his fellow man without at last finding the other end fastened about his own neck.
Frederick DouglassWhat shall be done with the four million slaves if they are emancipated? ... Primarily, it is a question less for man than for God -- less for human intellect than for the laws of nature to solve. It assumes that nature has erred; that the law of liberty is a mistake; that freedom, though a natural want of the human soul, can only be enjoyed at the expense of human welfare, and that men are better off in slavery than they would or could be in freedom; that slavery is the natural order of human relations, and that liberty is an experiment. What shall be done with them? Our answer is, do nothing with them; mind your business, and let them mind theirs. Your doing with them is their greatest misfortune. They have been undone by your doings, and all they now ask, and really have need of at your hands, is just to let them alone. They suffer by every interference, and succeed best by being let alone.
Frederick DouglassTo educate a man is to unfit him to be a slave.
Frederick DouglassI know no class of my fellowmen, however just, enlightened, and humane, which can be wisely and safely trusted absolutely with the liberties of any other class.
Frederick DouglassWhat is possible for me is possible for you.
Frederick DouglassLet us render the tyrant no aid; let us not hold the light by which he can trace the footprints of our flying brother.
Albert EinsteinAny power must be an enemy of mankind which enslaves the individual by power and by force, whether it arises under the Fascist or the Communist flag. All that is valuable in human society depends upon the opportunity for development accorded to the individual.
Ralph Waldo EmersonWherever a man comes, there comes revolution. The old is for slaves.
Alex EpsteinAmerica was founded on the principle of inalienable rights, not dictated duties. The Declaration of Independence states that every human being has a right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It does not state that he is born a slave to the needs of others.
EuripidesBut this is slavery, not to speak one’s thought.
Justice Stephen J. FieldHere I close my opinion. I could not say less in view of
questions of such gravity that go down to the very foundations of the government. If the
provisions of the Constitution can be set aside by an Act of Congress, where is the course
of usurpation to end? The present assault upon capital is but the beginning. It will be but
the stepping-stone to others, larger and more sweeping, till our political contests will
become a war of the poor against the rich; a war growing in intensity and bitterness.
Andrew FletcherAnd I cannot see, why arms should be denied to any man who is not a slave, since they are the only true badges of liberty.
Benjamin Franklin[A]s all history informs us, there has been in every State & Kingdom a constant kind of warfare between the
governing & governed: the one striving to obtain more for its support, and the other to pay less. And this has alone occasioned great convulsions,
actual civil wars, ending either in dethroning of the Princes, or enslaving of the people. Generally indeed the ruling power carries its point, the
revenues of princes constantly increasing, and we see that they are never satisfied, but always in want of more. The more the people are discontented
with the oppression of taxes; the greater need the prince has of money to distribute among his partisans and pay the troops that are to suppress all
resistance, and enable him to plunder at pleasure. There is scarce a king in a hundred who would not, if he could, follow the example of Pharaoh, get
first all the peoples money, then all their lands, and then make them and their children servants for ever ...
Benjamin FranklinA nation of well informed men who have been taught to know and prize the rights which God has given them cannot be enslaved. It is in the region of ignorance that tyranny begins.
Benjamin Franklin... as all history informs us, there has been in every State & Kingdom a constant kind of warfare between the governing & governed: the one striving to obtain more for its support, and the other to pay less. And this has alone occasioned great convulsions, actual civil wars, ending either in dethroning of the Princes, or enslaving of the people. Generally indeed the ruling power carries its point, the revenues of princes constantly increasing, and we see that they are never satisfied, but always in want of more. The more the people are discontented with the oppression of taxes; the greater need the prince has of money to distribute among his partisans and pay the troops that are to suppress all resistance, and enable him to plunder at pleasure. There is scarce a king in a hundred who would not, if he could, follow the example of Pharaoh, get first all the peoples money, then all their lands, and then make them and their children servants for ever ...
Erich FrommThe danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that man may become robots.
Mahatma Mohandas K. GandhiThe moment the slave resolves that he will no longer be a slave, his fetters fall. ... Freedom and slavery are mental states. Therefore, the first thing to say to yourself: 'I shall no longer accept the role of a slave. I shall not obey orders as such but shall disobey them when they are in conflict with my conscience'.
Helen H. GardnerThe most fatal blow to progress is slavery of the intellect. The most sacred right of humanity is the right to think, and next to the right to think is the right to express that thought without fear.
William Lloyd GarrisonEnslave the liberty of but one human being and the liberties of the world are put in peril.
Khalil GibranHe who does not prefer exile to slavery is not free by any measure of freedom, truth or duty.
Joseph Paul GoebbelsNational Socialism is a religion. All we lack is a religious genius capable of uprooting outmoded religious practices and putting new ones in their place. We lack traditions and ritual. One day soon National Socialism will be the religion of all Germans. My Party is my church, and I believe I serve the Lord best if I do his will, and liberate my oppressed people from the fetters of slavery. That is my gospel.
Joseph Paul GoebbelsThe money pigs of capitalist democracy… Money has made slaves of us… Money is the curse of mankind. It smothers the seed of everything great and good. Every penny is sticky with sweat and blood.
Johann Wolfgang von GoetheNone are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.
Barry GoldwaterMost Americans have no real understanding of the operation of the international money lenders. The accounts of the Federal Reserve System have never been audited. It operates outside of the control of Congress and manipulates the credit of the United States.
Horace GreeleyWhile boasting of our noble deeds we're careful to conceal the ugly fact that by an iniquitous money system we have nationalized a system of oppression which, though more refined, is not less cruel than the old system of chattel slavery.
Horace GreeleyWe have stricken the shackles from 4,000,000 human beings and brought all labourers to a common level, but not so much by the elevation of former slaves as by reducing the whole working population, white and black, to a condition of serfdom. While boasting of our noble deeds, we are careful to conceal the ugly fact that by our iniquitous money system we have manipulated a system of oppression which, though more refined, is no less cruel than the old system of chattel slavery.
Angelica GrimkeThe doctrine of blind obedience and unqualified submission to any human power, whether civil or ecclesiastical, is the doctrine of despotism, and ought to have no place among Republicans and Christians.


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