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“What if English toil and blood Was poured forth, even as a flood? It availed, Oh, Liberty, To dim, but not extinguish thee.”
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) said by 1822 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The old laws of England — they Whose reverend heads with age are gray, Children of a wiser day; And whose solemn voice must be Thine own echo — Liberty!”
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) said by 1822 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Let there be light! said Liberty, And like sunrise from the sea, Athens arose!”
Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) said by 1822 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Through a wise and salutary neglect [of the colonies], a generous nature has been suffered to take her own way to perfection; when I reflect upon these effects, when I see how profitable they have been to us, I feel all the pride of power sink and all presumption in the wisdom of human contrivances melt and die away within me. My vigour relents. I pardon something to the spirit of liberty.”
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) said by 1797 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Abstract liberty, like other mere abstractions, is not to be found.”
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) said by 1797 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Whenever a separation is made between liberty and justice, neither, in my opinion, is safe.”
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) first seen 1789 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to M. de Menonville (October 1789)
“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 (1729–1797) said by 1797 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The effect of liberty to individuals is, that they may do what they please: we ought to see what it will please them to do, before we risk congratulations.”
Edmund Burke (1729–1797) said by 1797 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A troubled and afflicted mankind looks to us, pleading for us to keep our rendezvous with destiny; that we will uphold the principles of self-reliance, self-discipline, morality, and, above all, responsible liberty for every individual that we will become that shining city on a hill.”
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) first seen 1979 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Official Announcement of being a candidate for U.S. President (13 November 1979)
“Concentrated power has always been the enemy of liberty.”
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) first seen 1981 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New Republic (16 December 1981) ; as cited in War and Conflict Quotations, eds. Michael & Jean Thomsett, McFarland (1997), p. 105
“Washington was so popular he could have been king had he wanted that. But he had no hunger for personal power. His love was liberty, and his trust was in the people. He believed they were dependable and right-minded and he believed that a leader's responsibility is to bring out their best qualities.”
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) said by 2004 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Whatever else history may say about me when I'm gone, I hope it will record that I appealed to your best hopes, not your worst fears; to your confidence rather than your doubts. My dream is that you will travel the road ahead with liberty's lamp guiding your steps and opportunity's arm steadying your way.”
Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) said by 2004 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and the success of liberty.”
John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) said by 1963 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Secondly, what does justice require? In the end, it requires liberty.”
John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) said by 1963 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The truth doesn't die. The desire for liberty cannot be fully suppressed.”
John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) said by 1963 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“But life is never easy. There is work to be done and obligations to be met — obligations to truth, to justice, and to liberty.”
John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) said by 1963 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“But little do or can the best of us: That little is achieved through Liberty.”
Robert Browning (1812–1889) said by 1889 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Lay the proud usurpers low! Tyrants fall in every foe! Liberty's in every blow— Let us do or die!”
Robert Burns (1759–1796) first seen 1794 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Scots Wha Hae, st. 5 (1794)
“Once did She hold the gorgeous east in fee; And was the safeguard of the west: the worth Of Venice did not fall below her birth, Venice, the eldest Child of Liberty.”
William Wordsworth (1770–1850) first seen 1802 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On the Extinction of the Venetian Republic, l. 1 (wr. 1802; pub. 1807)
“All this of Liberty and Equality, Electoral suffrages, Independence and so forth, we will take, therefore, to be a temporary phenomenon, by no means a final one. Though likely to last a long time, with sad enough embroilments for us all, we must welcome it, as the penalty of sins that are past, the pledge of inestimable benefits that are coming.”
Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) said by 1881 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“License they mean when they cry, Liberty! For who loves that must first be wise and good.”
John Milton (1608–1674) said by 1674 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: On the Detraction which followed upon my writing certain Treatises, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
“The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty.”
John Milton (1608–1674) said by 1674 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A day, an hour, of virtuous liberty Is worth a whole eternity in bondage.”
Joseph Addison (1672–1719) said by 1719 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Whoso taketh in hand to govern a multitude, either by way of liberty or principality, and cannot assure himself of those persons that are enemies to that enterprise, doth frame a state of short perseverance.”
Walter Raleigh (1552–1618) said by 1618 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“God grants liberty only to those who love it, and are always ready to guard and defend it.”
Daniel Webster (1782–1852) first seen 1834 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech (3 June 1834); reported in Edward Everett, ed., The Works of Daniel Webster (1851), volume iv, page 47
“What is an oath?” ... [I]t is founded on a degree of consciousness that there is a Power above us that will reward our virtues or punish our vices. ... [O]ur system of oaths in all our courts, by which we hold liberty and property and all our rights, are founded on or rest on Christianity and a religious belief.”
Daniel Webster (1782–1852) first seen 1844 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Mr. Webster’s Speech in Defense of the Christian Ministry and in Favor of the Religious Instruction of the Young, Delivered in the Supreme Court of the United States, February 10, 1844, in the Case of Stephen Girard’s W…
“Liberty exists in proportion to wholesome restraint.”
Daniel Webster (1782–1852) first seen 1847 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Speech at the Charleston Bar Dinner (May 10, 1847); reported in Edward Everett, ed., The Works of Daniel Webster (1851), Vol. II, p. 393
“Let our object be, our country, our whole country, and nothing but our country. And, by the blessing of God, may that country itself become a vast and splendid monument, not of oppression and terror, but of Wisdom, of Peace, and of Liberty, upon which the world may gaze with admiration for ever!”
Daniel Webster (1782–1852) said by 1852 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Like the cellar-growing vine is the Christian who lives in the darkness and bondage of fear. But let him go forth, with the liberty of God, into the light of love, and he will be like the plant in the field, healthy, robust, and joyful.”
Henry Ward Beecher (1813–1887) said by 1887 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“From Apollonius, true liberty, and unvariable steadfastness, and not to regard anything at all, though never so little, but right and reason: and always..that it was possible for the same man to be both vehement and remiss: a man not subject to be vexed, and offended with the incapacity of his scholars and auditors in his lectures and expositions.”
Marcus Aurelius (121–180) said by 180 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Under democracy individual liberty of opinion and action is jealously guarded.”
Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) first seen 1922 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Young India (2 March 1922)
“I'm a lover of my own liberty, and so I would do nothing to restrict yours. I simply want to please my own conscience, which is God.”
Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) first seen 1927 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Young India (21 January 1927)
“To deprive a man of his natural liberty and to deny to him the ordinary amenities of life is worse than starving the body.”
Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) first seen 1933 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Harijan, 15 April 1933,also in The Collected Works of Mahatma Gandhi, Vol. 52, p. 77.
“What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans, and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty and democracy?”
Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) first seen 1942 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Non-Violence in Peace and War, 1942, Vol. 1, Ch. 142
“I cannot be a communist now because I believe in only one thing: liberty. First, I would look after myself and do my work. Then I would care for my family. Then I would help my neighbor. But the state, I care nothing for. All the state has ever meant to me is unjust taxation... I believe in the absolute minimum of government.”
Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961) first seen 1934 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Letter to Ivan Kashkin, 19 August 1935, The Letters of Ernest Hemingway, Volume 6, 1934-1936, Edited by Sandra Spanier, Verna Kale & Miriam B. Mandel, Cambridge University Press, 2024, p. 333
“If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”
George Orwell (1903–1950) said by 1950 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Original preface to Animal Farm; as published in George Orwell: Some Materials for a Bibliography (1953) by Ian R. Willison
“He loves to sit and hear me sing, Then, laughing, sports and plays with me; Then stretches out my golden wing, And mocks my loss of liberty.”
William Blake (1757–1827) said by 1827 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The reason Milton wrote in fetters when he wrote of Angels and God, and at liberty when of Devils and Hell, is because he was a true poet and of the Devils' party without knowing it.”
William Blake (1757–1827) said by 1827 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“SUCH VISIONS HAVE APPEARD TO ME AS I MY ORDERD RACE HAVE RUN JERUSALEM IS NAMED LIBERTY AMONG THE SONS OF ALBION”
William Blake (1757–1827) said by 1827 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“You cannot have Liberty in this world without what you call Moral Virtue & you cannot have Moral Virtue without the Slavery of that half of the Human Race who hate what you call Moral Virtue”
William Blake (1757–1827) said by 1827 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“[T]hree of [Newt Gingrich's] "Five Principles of American Civilization" deal with business, technology, and organization — all characteristics of work. There is no mention of liberty or equality or, for that matter, of democracy.”
John Ralston Saul (born 1947) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To the mind of the ancients, who knew something of such matters, liberty and prosperity seemed hardly compatible, yet modern liberalism wants them together.”
George Santayana (1863–1952) said by 1952 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is not politics that can bring true liberty to the soul; that must be achieved, if at all, by philosophy;”
George Santayana (1863–1952) said by 1952 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I like to walk about amidst the beautiful things that adorn the world; but private wealth I should decline, or any sort of personal possessions, because they would take away my liberty.”
George Santayana (1863–1952) said by 1952 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Liberty ... is one of the most valuable blessings that Heaven has bestowed upon mankind.”
Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) said by 1616 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“And love, above all when it struggles against destiny, overwhelms us with the feeling of the vanity of this world of appearances and gives us a glimpse of another world, in which destiny is overcome and liberty is law.”
Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936) said by 1936 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“All unprejudiced persons objectively surveying the grim events in Bangladesh since March 25 have recognized the revolt of 75 million people, a people who were forced to the conclusion that neither their life, nor their liberty, to say nothing of the possibility of the pursuit of happiness, was available to them.”
Indira Gandhi (1917–1984) first seen 1971 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Referring to the fundamental rights of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" in the United States Declaration of Independence in a letter to Richard Nixon (December 15, 1971)..
“The people resemble a wild beast, which, naturally fierce and accustomed to live in the woods, has been brought up, as it were, in a prison and in servitude, and having by accident got its liberty, not being accustomed to search for its food, and not knowing where to conceal itself, easily becomes the prey of the first who seeks to incarcerate it again.”
Niccolò Machiavelli (1469–1527) said by 1527 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I don't believe in any form of unjustified extremism! But when a man is exercising extremism — a human being is exercising extremism — in defense of liberty for human beings it's no vice, and when one is moderate in the pursuit of justice for human beings I say he is a sinner.”
Malcolm X (1925–1965) first seen 1964 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Oxford Union Debate (December 3, 1964)
“Inside the henhouse from where he will be taken to be killed, the cock sings hymns to liberty because he was given two perches.”
Fernando Pessoa (1888–1935) said by 1935 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source