Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Comment on this quote Share via Email Print this Page [1-20] of 1279 Liberty quotesLiberty QuotesLiberty Next 20 quotes A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.~ Edward Abbey Freedom degenerates unless it has to struggle in its own defence.~ Lord Acton Liberty and good government do not exclude each other; and there are excellent reasons why they should go together. Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is itself the highest political end.~ Lord Acton Liberty, next to religion has been the motive of good deeds and the common pretext of crime...~ Lord Acton By liberty I mean the assurance that every man shall be protected in doing what he believes his duty against the influence of authority and majorities, custom and opinion.~ Lord Acton At all times sincere friends of freedom have been rare, and its triumphs have been due to minorities....~ Lord Acton By liberty I mean the assurance that every man shall be protected in doing what he believes is his duty against the influence of authority and majorities, custom and opinion.~ Lord Acton The most certain test by which we judge whether a country is really free is the amount of security enjoyed by minorities.~ Lord Acton Liberty is not a means to a higher political end. It is the highest political end.~ Lord Acton Liberty is the prevention of control by others. This requires self-control and, therefore, religious and spiritual influences; education, knowledge, well-being.~ Lord Acton It is bad to be oppressed by a minority, but it is worse to be oppressed by a majority.~ Lord Acton Absolute liberty is absence of restraint; responsibility is restraint; therefore, the ideally free individual is responsible to himself.~ Henry Brooks Adams But what do we mean by the American Revolution? Do we mean the American war? The Revolution was effected before the war commenced. The Revolution was in the minds and hearts of the people; a change in their religious sentiments, of their duties and obligations…This radical change in the principles, opinions, sentiments, and affections of the people was the real American Revolution.~ John Adams Human nature itself is evermore an advocate for liberty. There is also in human nature a resentment of injury, and indignation against wrong. A love of truth and a veneration of virtue. These amiable passions, are the "latent spark"... If the people are capable of understanding, seeing and feeling the differences between true and false, right and wrong, virtue and vice, to what better principle can the friends of mankind apply than to the sense of this difference?~ John Adams Human nature itself is evermore an advocate for liberty. There is also in human nature a resentment of injury, and indignation against wrong. A love of truth and a veneration of virtue. These amiable passions, are the "latent spark"… If the people are capable of understanding, seeing and feeling the differences between true and false, right and wrong, virtue and vice, to what better principle can the friends of mankind apply than to the sense of this difference?~ John Adams I shall have liberty to think for myself without molesting others or being molested myself.~ John Adams Liberty must at all hazards be supported. We have a right to it, derived from our Maker. But if we had not, our fathers have earned and bought it for us, at the expense of their ease, their estates, their pleasure, and their blood.~ John Adams Liberty, according to my metaphysics, is an intellectual quality, an attribute that belongs not to fate nor chance. Neither possesses it, neither is capable of it. There is nothing moral or immoral in the idea of it. The definition of it is a self-determining power in an intellectual agent. It implies thought and choice and power; it can elect between objects, indifferent in point of morality, neither morally good nor morally evil.~ John Adams Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people.~ John Adams Nip the shoots of arbitrary power in the bud, is the only maxim which can ever preserve the liberties of any people. When the people give way, their deceivers, betrayers, and destroyers press upon them so fast, that there is no resisting afterwards. The nature of the encroachment upon the American constitution is such, as to grow every day more and more encroaching. Like a cancer, it eats faster and faster every hour. The revenue creates pensioners, and the pensioners urge for more revenue. The people grow less steady, spirited, and virtuous, the seekers more numerous and more corrupt, and every day increases the circles of their dependents and expectants, until virtue, integrity, public spirit, simplicity, and frugality, become the objects of ridicule and scorn, and vanity, luxury, foppery, selfishness, meanness, and downright venality swallow up the whole society.~ John Adams Next 20 quotes Share on Facebook Tweet Email Print