Quotes by famous people, credited to who said them. Your own quotes must not match any of these. More are added all the time. 1,161,747 quotes Who coined it · How we decide
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Freedom
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“The question is whether personal freedom is worth the terrible effort, the never-lifted burden and risks of self-reliance.”
Rose Wilder Lane (1886–1968) first seen 1936 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Said in 1936, as quoted in The Ghost in the Little House, prologue, by William V. Holtz (1993).
“I am a Republican because I believe in the constitution, strength in national defense, limited government, individual freedom, and personal responsibility as the concrete foundation for American government. They reinforce the resolve that the United States is the greatest country in the world and we can all be eternally grateful to our founding fathers for the beautiful legacy they left us today.”
Martha Raye (1916–1994) said by 1994 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In 1986 Filipinos peacefully reclaimed their civil liberties in the people power revolution. Under the leadership of Corazon Aquino, we reaffirmed our commitment to freedom and democracy on a mere stretch of highway — with hardly a drop of blood shed or a shot fired in anger.”
Gloria Macapagal Arroyo (born 1947) first seen 2001 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: 2001 State of The Nation Address, Philippines
“In the pursuit of wealth and development, education and opportunities, security and peace, and freedom and health, not a single Filipino or corner of the Philippines should be left behind.”
Francis Escudero (born 1969) first seen 2015 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Avendano, Christine O. "'We're running under Partido Pilipinas", Philippine Daily Inquirer, 18 September 2015, p. A15.
“At the same time, through the passage of the Freedom of Information Bill and a crackdown on anomalies, we will fight corruption by ensuring that the government will be run on a simple principle—that discretion equals corruption. Minimize discretion and we will be able to minimize corruption; eliminate it and we will be able to eliminate corruption.”
Francis Escudero (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I commend our soldiers for their gallantry and bravery and for fighting for our freedom. I want to know if our soldiers were killed in a legitimate encounter or were they again butchered like pigs like what happened with our five marines.”
Francis Escudero (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Like the late former president Cory Aquino, whose recent demise we mourn, Suu Kyi has fearlessly demonstrated her steely resolve not to be intimidated by those who seek to snuff out the light of freedom, and have chosen instead to wage war rather than promote peace.”
Francis Escudero (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The heroism of our soldiers is especially inspiring because most of them were in their 20s, inexperienced in the art of warfare, who answered the call of the motherland with unflinching courage - so very much like the revolutionaries who won freedom and founded Asia's First Republic.”
Francis Escudero (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“He said: "The right of reply is better than realized through editorial discretion and voluntary acts rather than through forcible dictation through state machinery which infringes upon a basic freedom.”
Francis Escudero (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We cannot legislate responsibility. Self-regulation is the best option. I have crossed the line; I stand on the side of press freedom.”
Francis Escudero (born 1969) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“This country has shed more blood for the freedom of other people than all the other nations in the history of the world combined, and I'm tired of people feeling like they've got to apologize for America.”
Fred Thompson (1942–2015) said by 2015 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Women's liberation should develop with democratic values, equality and freedom.”
Abdullah Öcalan (born 1948) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“1. The right of determination of the people includes the right to a state of their own. However, the foundation of a state does not increase the freedom of a people. The system of the United nations that is based on nation-states has remained inefficient social development. Democratic confederalism is the contrasting paradigm of the oppressed people.”
Abdullah Öcalan (born 1948) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The most important problem for freedom in a social context is thus family and marriage. When the woman marries, she is in fact enslaved. It is impossible to imagine another institution that enslaves like marriage. The most profound slaveries are established by the institution of marriage, slaveries that become more entrenched within the family.”
Abdullah Öcalan (born 1948) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The source of my work is nature. I use it with respect and freedom. I use materials, ideas, movement and time to express a whole view of my art in the world.”
Richard Long (born 1945) first seen 1982 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Richard Long (1982), cited in: Description of the exhibition Concentrations IX: Richard Long, March 31–July 8, 1984 at the Dallas Museum of Art.
“This feels right. It feels like it digs right into where I need to be … This is becoming my new freedom… I feel like I’ve finally cracked it, girl!”
Rihanna (born 1988) first seen 2025 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Rihanna Talks ‘R9’ in New Interview: ‘I Feel Like I’ve Finally Cracked It’Rolling stone (Feb 24, 2025)
“We properly judge a critic's virtue not by his freedom from error but by the nature of the mistakes he does make, for he makes them, if he is worth reading, because he has in mind something besides his perceptions about art in itself — he has in mind the demands that he makes upon life.”
Lionel Trilling (1905–1975) said by 1975 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I lost part of myself to him then, and a soaring sense of freedom revealed that this must have been my purpose from the first: to become a part of Phineas.”
John Knowles (1926–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I've always tried to push things to the limit, but when I started, the censors to be feared were old, conservative, religious men, whereas today the censors are young, rich, liberal men who seem to be against the freedom of expression I fought for. [...] people should be able to have an opinion they don't agree with and still be friends, have a dialogue, or argue about it.”
John Waters (born 1946) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“For me the Koenigsberg longshoremen had beauty; the Polish jimkes on their grain ships had beauty; the broad freedom of movement in the gestures of the common people had beauty. Middle-class people held no appeal for me at all. Bourgeois life on the whole seemed to me pedantic.”
Käthe Kollwitz (1867–1945) first seen 1941 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: In Retrospect" (1941).
“There has been remarkably little pushback against the Islamic and leftist assault against the freedom of speech. For the most part, those in positions of power and influence seem not to realize the implications of what is happening, or else they don’t care—when they aren’t actively complicit in the steady muzzling of dissent.”
Robert Spencer (born 1962) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Individual freedom and individual equality cannot co-exist. I dare say no one since Thomas Jefferson has really believed it.”
Katharine Fullerton Gerould (1879–1944) said by 1944 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The more difficult a man's life had been before the camp, the more furiously he lied. This lie had no practical purpose; it served simply to glorify freedom. How could a man be unhappy outside the camp?”
Vasily Grossman (1905–1964) said by 1964 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“When a man talks with absolute sincerity and freedom he goes on a voyage of discovery. The whole company has shares in the enterprise.”
John Jay Chapman (1862–1933) first seen 1898 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Society, Causes and Consequences (1898)
“Body and soul, Black America reveals the extreme questions of contemporary life, questions of freedom and identity: How can I be who I am?”
June Jordan (1936–2002) said by 2002 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Socialism, I want to propose, is the hope for human freedom and justice under the unprecedented conditions of life that humanity will face in the twenty-first century.”
Michael Harrington (1928–1989) said by 1989 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Freedom implies space; it means having the power and enough room in which to act.”
Yi-Fu Tuan (1930–2022) said by 2022 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Apart from the Kingdom of the Lord there is not on this earth any nation that is superior to any other. Should it happen that a strong Government finds it may with impunity destroy a weak people, then the hour strikes for that weak people to appeal to the League of Nations to give its judgment in all freedom. God and history will remember your judgment.”
Haile Selassie (1892–1975) said by 1975 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Freedom from a desire to control the outcome, and respect for the capacity of the group, and skills in releasing individual expression”
Carl Rogers (1902–1987) said by 1987 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Allowance of the freedom of choices in direction, either for the group or individuals particularly in the near future”
Carl Rogers (1902–1987) said by 1987 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Lost is our freedom, When we submit to women so: Why do we need them, When in their best they work our woe?”
Thomas Campion (1567–1620) said by 1620 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Women's Studies can amount simply to compensatory history; too often they fail to challenge the intellectual and political structures that must be challenged if women as a group are ever to come into collective, nonexclusionary freedom.”
Adrienne Rich (1929–2012) said by 2012 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If we are to cherish freedom, and to guard it, we must remember what the alternative is: the bread of affliction and the bitter herbs of slavery.”
Jonathan Sacks, Baron Sacks (1948–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Paradoxically, the freedom of Paris is associated with a persistent belief that nothing ever changes. Paris, they say, is the city that changes least. After an absence of twenty or thirty years, one still recognizes it.”
Marguerite Duras (1914–1996) first seen 1984 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Tourists in Paris, from Outside: Selected Writings (1984).
“We may think as we like theoretically, about man’s freedom of action, we must practically start from it as the foundation of the moral law, for only under this condition is social morality possible.”
Eduard Bernstein (1850–1932) said by 1932 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Happy slaves are the bitterest enemies of freedom”
Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (1830–1916) said by 1916 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The idea of having an ambient space-time of some specific dimension seems to play less of a role of string theory than in conventional physics, and certainly less than the kind of role that I would myself feel comfortable with. It is particularly difficult to assess the functional freedom that is involved in a physical theory unless one has a clear idea of its actual space-time dimensionality.”
Roger Penrose (born 1931) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Why should there be any more the old dividing line between man and his brother-man? why should the fires of prejudice flare up anew between us? why should we not maintain this common ground which we have found at last, and hedge it round, and protect it — the stronghold of freedom and of all the humanities for the long years to come?”
Felix Adler (1851–1933) said by 1933 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Those who understand the way it is, rather than the way they wish it were, are on the path to freedom.”
Noah Levine (born 1971) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Freedom! A wanton slut on a profligate's breast!”
Marina Tsvetaeva (1892–1941) first seen 1917 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: You came out of a severe, well-proportioned church (1917).
“May Sarton said, "the deeper you go, the more universal you become." It's a reminder to me that those things I try to convince myself I don't need to admit are usually those things I need the most to say. Speaking the truth, in its most poignant details, is liberating and gives those around us the freedom to be real.”
Sabrina Ward Harrison (born 1975) first seen 1999 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Quoted by Katherine Martin in Women of Courage: Inspiring Stories from the Women Who Lived Them, p. 269 (1999)
“A seven year old boy joined my line. I asked him, "What are you doing?" He said, "Marching." I asked him, "Why are you marching?" He looked up at me and said, "For my freedom.”
Maurice Davis (1921–1993) said by 1993 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“That there is also freedom in captivity, only a prisoner can claim. Coming from a prison guard, this statement would be blasphemy.”
Friedrich Dürrenmatt (1921–1990) first seen 1977 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: About Tolerance (1977)
“And Thee, across the harbor, silver-paced As though the sun took step of thee, yet left Some motion ever unspent in thy stride, Implicitly thy freedom staying thee!”
Hart Crane (1899–1932) said by 1932 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The Bridge. In The Norton Anthology of Modern Poetry, by Richard Ellmann and Robert O'Clair (1988).
“Never since Drake and Raleigh won Our freedom of the seas, Have sons of Britain dared and done More valiantly than these.”
Alfred Noyes (1880–1958) first seen 1941 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: To the R.A.F., in Shadows on the Down and Other Poems (1941), p. 2
“Happy, thrice happy shall they be pronounced hereafter, who have contributed any thing, who have performed the meanest office in erecting this stupendous fabrick of Freedom and Empire on the broad basis of Independency; who have assisted in protecting the rights of humane nature and establishing an Asylum for the poor and oppressed of all nations and religions.”
George Washington (1732–1799) first seen 1783 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: General Orders (18 April 1783)
“Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.”
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) said by 1865 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“This is a world of compensation; and he would be no slave must consent to have no slaves. Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.”
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) said by 1865 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The Confederacy stands for slavery and the Union for freedom.”
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) first seen 1862 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Private conversation (January 1862)
“Freedom is the expression of my truest self/ The cry of being deepest being!”
Kuruvilla Pandikattu (born 1957) wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source