quotations about liberty
Too little liberty brings stagnation, and too much brings chaos.
BERTRAND RUSSELL
Authority and the Individual
If liberty were to go on a pilgrimage all over the earth, she would find a home in every house, and a welcome in every heart.
WILLIAM ELDER
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
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
A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty is worth a whole eternity in bondage.
JOSEPH ADDISON
Cato
He that has his chains knocked off, and the prison doors set open to him, is perfectly at liberty, because he may either go or stay, as he best likes; though his preference be determined to stay, by the darkness of the night, or illness of the weather, or want of other lodging.
JOHN LOCKE
An Essay Concerning Human Understanding
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
Perhaps it is a universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged against provisions against danger, real or pretended from abroad.
JAMES MADISON
letter to Thomas Jefferson, May 13, 1798
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
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
For though the flame of liberty may sometimes cease to shine, the coal can never expire.
THOMAS PAINE
The Crisis
Liberty, once lost, is lost forever.
JOHN ADAMS
letter to Abigail Adams, Jul. 17, 1775
Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding.
LOUIS BRANDEIS
Olmstead v. United States
Establish liberty on a rock of brass.
MAXIMILIEN DE ROBESPIERRE
report of the 18 Pluvoise, Year II
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
We are right to take alarm at the first experiment upon our liberties.
JAMES MADISON
attributed, Quote Junkie Presidents Edition
A traitor is good fruit to hang from the boughs of the tree of liberty.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
We are not to expect to be translated from despotism to liberty in a featherbed.
THOMAS JEFFERSON
letter to Lafayette, The Thomas Jefferson Papers
The spontaneous action of the people themselves alone can create liberty.
MIKHAIL BAKUNIN
God and the State