Henry Brooks Adams Quote - Liberty Quotes Blog

"Absolute liberty is absence of restraint; responsibility is restraint; therefore, the ideally free individual is responsible to himself."

by:	Henry Brooks Adams (1838-1918) Pulitzer prize-winning historian (1919), great-grandson of John Adams, grandson of John Quincy Adams, and son of US Secretary of State, Charles Adams
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Categories:	Individualism, Liberty, Responsibility, Restraint
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Reader comments about this quote:

Nice way of putting it -- Ben, Orem, UT 1
Being responsible to one's "self" is great idea, but it needs to be backed up by a system of Justice rather than our present system of convoluted laws. -- J Carlton, Calgary 1
10 stars for as far as it goes. A rating of 5 stars here if the free individual's responsibility to self includes an harmonious expression of natural law (his rights end where my nose begins, etc.) and justice. -- Mike, Norwalk
5 stars to the quote and the above comments. -- jim k, Austin
We are born into anarchy responsble only 'to' ourselves. Restraint where the rights of others are concerned is being responsible 'for' ourselves or i.e. responsible for our actions and where others come into the picture we become responsible 'to' them but not neccesarily 'for' them. -- Anon 1
We are all 'free' to do wrong -- but we are not free from the consequences. That's why 'freedom' does require responsible restraint from mere passion. -- E Archer, NYC 1
"This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man." -- Logan, Memphis, TN 2
-- Wayne, Naples
-- aa, hb
-- Ronw13, Oregon
-- Mary, MI
A clarification of terms is required to fully understand the concept. Liberty is; “The power of acting as one thinks fit, without any restraint or control, except from the laws of nature.” (Bouvier’s Law Dictionary) Responsibility is: “The obligation to answer for an act done, and to repair any injury it may have caused. This obligation arises without any contract, either on the part of the party bound to repair the injury, or of the party injured. The law gives to the person who has suffered loss, a compensation in damages. It is a general rule that no one is answerable for the acts of another unless he has, by some act of his own, concurred in them.” (Bouvier’s Law Dictionary) SO, as an absolute element of liberty - responsibility’s restraints define the parameters of the whole that that is “absolute liberty”, individual sovereignty, inalienable rights, and liberty / freedom at nature’s law. -- Mike, Norwalk 1
As I sit here to point of shear embarrassment to understand that I am a citizen of a country that 80 years ago this week dropped nuclear weapons on human life I will try to pull myself together to try to make some semblance of sense attributed to this quote. The adult understands that the positive attributes of life are strenuously earned and the individual and the community are interconnectivity intertwined. If you truly sensitively are responsible to yourself, you are connectedly responsible to all. The old adage "a friend to one is a friend to all" holds firm. -- Fredrick William Sillik, Anytown

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