freedom quotes from influential philosophers, authors and people
"He who is brave is free."
26
"A man can be himself only so long as he is alone, and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom, for it is only when he is alone that he is really free."
92
"We have more possibilities, more freedom, more options than any people who have ever lived. Yet there is more junk, more mediocrity, more garbage to sort through than ever too."
113
"The paradox seems to be, as Socrates demonstrated long ago, that the truly free individual is free only to the extent of his own self-mastery. While those who will not govern themselves are condemned to find masters to govern over them."
323
"Between stimulus and response, there is space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom."
337
"There is nothing in life that can't be handled. If we choose, there is no situation in which we are not free. The road to freedom is also the road to happiness."
338
"The free man is a warrior."
364
"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself."
371
"Religion is the masterpiece of the art of animal training, for it trains people as to how they shall think."
398
"The liberty of the individual is no gift of civilization. It was greatest before there was any civilization."
553
"Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility."
564
"We give up leisure in order that we may have leisure, just as we go to war in order that we may have peace."
574
"It is better to risk saving a guilty person than to condemn an innocent one."
702
"It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything."
785
"Freedom will only come when you no longer trade your time for money."
836
"Find a person who is as successful as you’d like to be, ask them what to do, do it and work hard."
837
"Freedom…comes down to a single question: do you consider it moral to treat men as sacrificial animals and to rule them by physical force?"
874
"Freedom, in a political context, means freedom from government coercion. It does not mean freedom from the landlord, or freedom from the employer, or freedom from the laws of nature which do not provide men with automatic prosperity."
875
"In a capitalist society, all human relationships are voluntary. Men are free to cooperate or not, to deal with one another or not, as their own individual judgments, convictions, and interests dictate."
876
"A society that robs an individual of the product of his effort…is…but a mob held together by institutionalized gang-rule."
877
"It is the institution of private property that protects and implements the right to disagree."
878
"The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities."
879
"Men being, as has been said, by nature, all free, equal and independent, no one can be put out of this estate, and subjected to the political power of another, without his own consent."
959
"I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery."
996
"Every man having been born free and master of himself, no one else may under any pretext whatever subject him without his consent. To assert that the son of a slave is born a slave is to assert that he is not born a man."
1010
"I have never thought, for my part, that man's freedom consists in his being able to do whatever he wills, but that he should not, by any human power, be forced to do what is against his will."
1012
"The word ‘slavery’ and ‘right’ are contradictory, they cancel each other out. Whether as between one man and another, or between one man and a whole people, it would always be absurd to say: "I hereby make a covenant with you which is wholly at your expense and wholly to my advantage; I will respect it so long as I please and you shall respect it as long as I wish."
1024
"Falsehood has an infinity of combinations, but truth has only one mode of being."
1025
"MAN is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. One thinks himself the master of others, and still remains a greater slave than they."
1026
"The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion."
1027
"A free press can, of course, be good or bad, but, most certainly without freedom, the press will never be anything but bad."
1042
"Freedom is nothing but a chance to be better."
1045
"Truth is mysterious, elusive, always to be conquered. Liberty is dangerous, as hard to live with as it is elating. We must march toward these two goals, painfully but resolutely, certain in advance of our failings on so long a road."
1051
"People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use."
1056
"Anxiety is the dizziness of freedom."
1057
"If you serve too many masters, you'll soon suffer."
1100
"Satisfaction consists in freedom from pain, which is the positive element of life."
95
"A 'right'…means freedom from physical compulsion, coercion or interference by other men."
860