FREEDOM QUOTES IV

quotations about freedom

Freedom quote

For one to be free there must be at least two. Freedom signifies a social relation, an asymmetry of social conditions: essentially it implies social difference--it presumes and implies the presence of social division. Some can be free only in so far as there is a form of dependence they can aspire to escape.

ZYGMUNT BAUMAN

Freedom


Real freedom lies in wildness, not in civilization.

CHARLES LINDBERGH

attributed, Lindbergh


The unity of all who dwell in freedom is their only sure defense.

DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER

Second Inaugural Address, Jan. 21, 1957


May the light of freedom, coming to all darkened lands, flame brightly--until at last the darkness is no more.

DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER

Second Inaugural Address, Jan. 21, 1957


Freedom can be manifested only in the void of beliefs, in the absence of axioms, and only where the laws have no more authority than a hypothesis.

EMIL CIORAN

History & Utopia


I was a dweller amid shadows grim:
Till FREEDOM touched my yearning eyes, and lo!
Life in a shining circle, rounding rose,
As heaven on heaven goes up the jewell'd night.
New floods of passionate life swirl'd at my heart,
Like Ocean-surges rolling round the world:
And FREEDOM was my glittering Bride.

GERALD MASSEY

"To My Wife"


Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.

JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

The Social Contract


Without total freedom, every perception, every objective regard, is twisted. It is only the man who is totally free who can look and understand immediately. Freedom implies really, doesn't it, the total emptying of the mind. Completely to empty the whole content of the mind--that is real freedom. Freedom is not mere revolt from circumstances, which again breeds other circumstances, other environmental influences, which enslave the mind. We are talking about a freedom that comes naturally, easily, unasked for, when the mind is capable of functioning at its highest level.

JIDDU KRISHNAMURTI

On Freedom


This is my right
A right given by God
To live a free life
To live in freedom

PAUL MCCARTNEY

"Freedom"


The supreme end is the freedom of the spirit.

SRI AUROBINDO

Bhagavad Gita and Its Message


Freedom is a heavy load, a great and strange burden for the spirit to undertake. It is not easy. It is not a gift given, but a choice made, and the choice may be a hard one. The road goes upward towards the light; but the laden traveler may never reach the end of it.

URSULA K. LE GUIN

The Tombs of Atuan


Mistaking insolence for freedom has always been the hallmark of the slave.

WILHELM REICH

Listen


Since freedom is not a fixed thing that can be grasped and held once for all, but a growth, any particular society, such as our own, always appears partly free and partly unfree. In so far as it favors, in every child, the development of his highest possibilities, it is free, but where it falls short of this it is not.

CHARLES HORTON COOLEY

Human Nature and the Social Order


It's only after you've lost everything that you're free to do anything.

CHUCK PALAHNIUK

Fight Club


We know what works: Freedom works. We know what's right: Freedom is right. We know how to secure a more just and prosperous life for man on Earth: through free markets, free speech, free elections, and the exercise of free will unhampered by the state.

GEORGE H. W. BUSH

Inaugural Address, Jan. 20, 1989


I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power, than by violent and sudden usurpations.

JAMES MADISON

speech at the Virginia Convention to ratify the Federal Constitution, Jun. 6, 1788


For every man who lives without freedom, the rest of us must face the guilt.

LILLIAN HELLMAN

The Watch on the Rhine


The most certain test by which we judge whether a country is really free is the amount of security enjoyed by minorities.

LORD ACTON

The History of Freedom in Antiquity


Once a man has tasted freedom, he will never be content to be a slave.

WALT DISNEY

radio address, Mar. 1, 1941


Freedom is sometimes defined as a lack of resistance or restraint. A wheel turns freely if there is very little friction in the bearing, a horse breaks free from the post to which it has been tethered, a man frees himself from the branch on which he has been caught while climbing a tree. Physical restraint is an obvious condition, which seems particularly useful in defining freedom, but with respect to important issues, it is a metaphor and not a very good one. People are indeed controlled by fetters, handcuffs, strait jackets, and the walls of jails and concentration camps, but what may be called behavioral control--the restraint imposed by contingencies of reinforcement--is a very different thing.

BURRHUS FREDERIC SKINNER

Beyond Freedom & Dignity