quotations about liberty
Liberty, too, must be limited in order to be possessed.
EDMUND BURKE
letter to the Sheriffs of Bristol, Apr. 3, 1777
Let us therefore animate and encourage each other, and show the whole world that a Freeman, contending for liberty on his own ground, is superior to any slavish mercenary on earth.
GEORGE WASHINGTON
general orders, Jul. 2, 1776
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
The cause of liberty is one and the same all over the world.
GEORGE THOMPSON
attributed, Day's Collacon
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
But what is liberty without wisdom, and without virtue? It is the greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness, without tuition or restraint.
EDMUND BURKE
Reflections on the Revolution in France
The idea of intellectual liberty is under attack from two directions. On the one side are its theoretical enemies, the apologists of totalitarianism, and on the other its immediate, practical enemies, monopoly and bureaucracy.
GEORGE ORWELL
"Notes on Nationalism"
It is for man to establish the reign of liberty in the midst of the world of the given. To gain the supreme victory, it is necessary, for one thing, that by and through their natural differentiation men and women unequivocally affirm their brotherhood.
SIMONE DE BEAUVOIR
Le Deuxieme Sexe
Too little liberty brings stagnation, and too much brings chaos.
BERTRAND RUSSELL
Authority and the Individual
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
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.
LORD BOLINGBROKE
The Works of the Late Right Honorable Henry St. John, Lord Viscount Bolingbroke
A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty is worth a whole eternity in bondage.
JOSEPH ADDISON
Cato
Many politicians of our time are in the habit of laying it down as a self-evident proposition, that no people ought to be free till they are fit to use their freedom. The maxim is worthy of the fool in the old story, who resolved not to go into the water till he had learnt to swim. If men are to wait for liberty till they become wise and good in slavery, they may indeed wait for ever.
THOMAS BABINGTON MACAULAY
Critical and Historical Essays
What is so beneficial to the people as liberty, which we see not only to be greedily sought after by men, but also by beasts, and to be preferred to all things.
CICERO
attributed, Day's Collacon
I am a fanatic lover of liberty, considering it as the unique condition under which intelligence, dignity and human happiness can develop and grow; not the purely formal liberty conceded, measured out and regulated by the State, an eternal lie which in reality represents nothing more than the privilege of some founded on the slavery of the rest; not the individualistic, egoistic, shabby, and fictitious liberty extolled by the School of J. J. Rousseau and other schools of bourgeois liberalism, which considers the would-be rights of all men, represented by the State which limits the rights of each -- an idea that leads inevitably to the reduction of the rights of each to zero. No, I mean the only kind of liberty that is worthy of the name, liberty that consists in the full development of all the material, intellectual and moral powers that are latent in each person; liberty that recognizes no restrictions other than those determined by the laws of our own individual nature, which cannot properly be regarded as restrictions since these laws are not imposed by any outside legislator beside or above us, but are immanent and inherent, forming the very basis of our material, intellectual and moral being -- they do not limit us but are the real and immediate conditions of our freedom.
MIKHAIL BAKUNIN
"La Commune de Paris et la notion de l'etat"
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
Lacon
Through too much liberty all things run to ruin and confusion. Liberty in the mind is a sign of goodness; in the tongue, of foolishness; in the hand, of theft; in our life, of want of grace.
M. PARKER
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
Liberty is potential. To create a free being is to place before it the problem of its destiny.
SABINE BARING-GOULD
The Origin and Development of Religious Belief: Christianity
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