Liberty is to the collective body, what health is to every individual body. Without health no pleasure can be tasted by man; without liberty, no happiness can be enjoyed by society.
—Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke (1678–1751) British Statesman, Philosopher
There is no better measure of a person than what he does when he is absolutely free to choose.
—Wilma Askinas
Rich people think long-term. They balance their spending on enjoyment today with investing for freedom tomorrow.
—T. Harv Eker (b.1954) American Motivational Speaker, Lecturer, Author
At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
Liberty will not descend to a people, a people must raise themselves to liberty; it is a blessing that must be earned before it can be enjoyed.
—Charles Caleb Colton (c.1780–1832) English Clergyman, Aphorist
Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have.
—Harry Emerson Fosdick (1878–1969) American Baptist Minister
The fly that touches honey cannot use it’s wings; so too the soul that clings to spiritual sweetness ruins it’s freedom and hinders contemplation.
—Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) Indian Mystic, Philosopher, Poet
The liberated man is not the one who is freed in his ideal reality, his inner truth, or his transparency; he is the man who changes spaces, who circulates, who changes sex, clothes, and habits according to fashion, rather than morality, and who changes opinions not as his conscience dictates but in response to opinion polls.
—Jean Baudrillard (1929–2007) French Sociologist, Philosopher
If we do not believe in freedom of speech for those we despise we do not believe in it at all.
—Noam Chomsky (b.1928) American Linguist, Social Critic
Every general increase of freedom is accompanied by some degeneracy, attributable to the same causes as the freedom.
—Charles Cooley (1864–1929) American Sociologist
In order to inherit your freedom, you need to go towards it. You have to claim your own freedom before it becomes yours.
—John O’Donohue (1956–2008) Irish Priest, Hegelian Philosopher
Posterity! You will never know how much it cost the present generation to preserve your freedom. I hope you will make good use of it.
—John Quincy Adams (1767–1848) Sixth President of the USA
Freedom is the oxygen of the soul.
—Moshe Dayan (1915–81) Israeli Soldier, Statesman
The free way of life proposes ends, but it does not prescribe means.
—Robert F. Kennedy (1925–68) American Politician, Lawyer
Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.
—Fannie Lou Hamer (1917–77) American Civil Rights Activist
Liberty has restraints but no frontiers.
—David Lloyd George (1863–1945) British Liberal Statesman
The only conception of freedom I can have is that of the prisoner or the individual in the midst of the State. The only one I know is freedom of thought and action.
—Albert Camus (1913–60) Algerian-born French Philosopher, Dramatist, Novelist
The true danger is, when liberty is nibbled away, for expedients, and by parts.
—Edmund Burke (1729–97) British Philosopher, Statesman
Only that thing is free which exists by the necessities of its own nature, and is determined in its actions by itself alone.
—Baruch Spinoza (1632–77) Dutch Philosopher, Theologian
The measure of a democracy is the measure of the freedom of its humblest citizens.
—John Galsworthy (1867–1933) English Novelist, Playwright
When a person places the proper value on freedom, there is nothing under the sun that he will not do to acquire that freedom. Whenever you hear a man saying he wants freedom, but in the next breath he is going to tell you what he won’t do to get it, or what he doesn’t believe in doing in order to get it, he doesn’t believe in freedom. A man who believes in freedom will do anything under the sun to acquire… or preserve his freedom.
—Malcolm X (1925–65) American Civil Rights Leader
Man is born free, yet he is everywhere in chains.
—Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78) Swiss-born French Philosopher
Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must, like men, undergo the fatigue of supporting it.
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809) American Nationalist, Author, Pamphleteer, Inventor
For in the end, freedom is a personal and lonely battle; and one faces down fears of today so that those of tomorrow might be engaged.
—Alice Walker (b.1944) American Novelist, Activist
Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.
—Aleister Crowley (1875–1947) English Occultist, Mystic, Magician
We have confused the free with the free and easy.
—Adlai Stevenson (1900–65) American Diplomat, Politician, Orator
The war for freedom will never really be won because the price of freedom is constant vigilance over ourselves and over our Government.
—Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962) American First Lady, Diplomat, Humanitarian
If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.
—George Orwell (1903–50) English Novelist, Journalist
All we have of freedom—all we use or know—this our fathers bought for us, long and long ago.
—Rudyard Kipling (1865–1936) British Writer, Poet, Novelist, Short Story Author
When people talk of the freedom of writing, speaking or thinking I cannot choose but laugh. No such thing ever existed. No such thing now exists; but I hope it will exist. But it must be hundreds of years after you and I shall write and speak no more.
—John Adams (1735–1826) American Head of State, Lawyer
Leave a Reply