LIBERTY QUOTES IV

quotations about liberty

Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth.

GEORGE WASHINGTON

letter to James Madison, Mar. 2, 1788


For Liberty can be lost by the practical men whose hearts are too shrunken to contain it. Liberty can be bartered away by the greedy minds who cannot see beyond their own day. Liberty can be stolen away by the robber and the brute. But Liberty grows like grass in the hearts of the common people, from the blood of their martyrs. And the tyrants rage and are gone, but the dream and the deed endure.

STEPHEN VINCENT BENÉT

Toward the Century of the Common Man

Tags: Stephen Vincent Benét


What good does it do me, after all, if an ever-watchful authority keeps an eye out to ensure that my pleasures will be tranquil and races ahead of me to ward off all danger, sparing me the need even to think about such things, if that authority, even as it removes the smallest thorns from my path, is also absolute master of my liberty and my life; if it monopolizes vitality and existence to such a degree that when it languishes, everything around it must also languish; when it sleeps, everything must also sleep; and when it dies, everything must also perish?

ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE

Democracy in America


It would indeed be ironic if, in the name of national defense, we would sanction the subversion of one of those liberties which make the defense of our nation worthwhile.

EARL WARREN

United States v. Robel


If there is one subject in this world worthy of being discussed, worthy of being understood, it is the question of intellectual liberty. Without that, we are simply painted clay.

ROBERT G. INGERSOLL

speech at the trial of C. B. Reynolds for blasphemy, May 1887


I hope we once again have reminded people that man is not free unless government is limited. There's a clear cause and effect here that is as neat and predictable as a law of physics: As government expands, liberty contracts.

RONALD REAGAN

Farewell Address, Jan. 11, 1989

Tags: Ronald Reagan


Advocates of capitalism are very apt to appeal to the sacred principles of liberty, which are embodied in one maxim: The fortunate must not be restrained in the exercise of tyranny over the unfortunate.

BERTRAND RUSSELL

Sceptical Essays

Tags: Bertrand Russell


A traitor is good fruit to hang from the boughs of the tree of liberty.

HENRY WARD BEECHER

Life Thoughts


A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty is worth a whole eternity in bondage.

JOSEPH ADDISON

Cato

Tags: Joseph Addison


Too little liberty brings stagnation, and too much brings chaos.

BERTRAND RUSSELL

Authority and the Individual

Tags: Bertrand Russell


On the question of liberty, as a principle, we are not what we have been. When we were the political slaves of King George, and wanted to be free, we called the maxim that "all men are created equal" a self-evident truth, but now when we have grown fat, and have lost all dread of being slaves ourselves, we have become so greedy to be masters that we call the same maxim "a self-evident lie." The Fourth of July has not quite dwindled away; it is still a great day--for burning fire-crackers!

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

letter to George Robertson, Aug. 15, 1855

Tags: Abraham Lincoln


Liberty is an old fact; it has had its heroes and its martyrs in almost every age. As I look back through the vista of centuries, I can see no end of the ranks of those who have toiled and suffered in its cause, and who wear upon their breasts its stars of the legion of honor.

EDWIN HUBBELL CHAPIN

Living Words

Tags: E. H. Chapin


When liberty is at stake, we cannot be too scrupulous; we must burnish up every precedent; we must parley upon a hair, for that hair may be a fibre of the eternal right upon which cling the destiny of millions.

C. R. WELD

attributed, Day's Collacon


True liberty consists exactly in self-determination in the direction of holiness. Man is never more free than when he moves consciously in the direction of God.

LOUIS BERKHOF

Systematic Theology

Tags: Louis Berkhof


The want of liberty is witnessed in hushed voices and low whisperings; liberty bursts into unshackled eloquence.

LUCY BARTON

attributed, Day's Collacon


Liberty ... is one of the most precious gifts which heaven has bestowed upon man; with it we cannot compare the treasures which the earth contains or the sea conceals; for liberty, as for honor, we can and ought to risk our lives; and on the other hand, captivity is the greatest evil that can befall a man.

MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

Don Quixote

Tags: Miguel de Cervantes


We are not to expect to be translated from despotism to liberty in a featherbed.

THOMAS JEFFERSON

letter to Lafayette, The Thomas Jefferson Papers


There are two kinds of people I could anathematize with a better weapon than St. Peter's -- those who dare deprive others of their liberty, and those who suffer others to do it.

JOHN LEDYARD

Travels and Adventures of John Ledyard


The word liberty has been falsely used by persons who, being degenerately profligate in private life, and mischievous in public, had no hope left but in fomenting discord.

TACITUS

attributed, Day's Collacon


The spirit of liberty must be cherished, if we would elevate, purify, and strengthen the fibre of the nation.

ARNAUD DE L'ARIEGE

attributed, Day's Collacon