FREEDOM QUOTES IV

quotations about freedom

Freedom quote

The cry for freedom is a sign of suppression. It will not cease to ring as long as man feels himself captive. As diverse as the cries for freedom may be, basically they all express one and the same thing: The intolerability of the rigidity of the organism and of the machine-like institutions which create a sharp conflict with the natural feelings for life. Not until there is a social order in which all cries for freedom subside will man have overcome his biological and social crippling, will he have attained genuine freedom.

WILHELM REICH

The Mass Psychology of Fascism


True freedom is to share
All the chains our brothers wear

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL

"Stanzas on Freedom"


Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

Out of My Later Years


Freedom can be manifested only in the void of beliefs, in the absence of axioms, and only where the laws have no more authority than a hypothesis.

EMIL CIORAN

History & Utopia


Freedom to reject is the only freedom.

SALMAN RUSHDIE

The Ground Beneath Her Feet


I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power, than by violent and sudden usurpations.

JAMES MADISON

speech at the Virginia Convention to ratify the Federal Constitution, Jun. 6, 1788


I was a dweller amid shadows grim:
Till FREEDOM touched my yearning eyes, and lo!
Life in a shining circle, rounding rose,
As heaven on heaven goes up the jewell'd night.
New floods of passionate life swirl'd at my heart,
Like Ocean-surges rolling round the world:
And FREEDOM was my glittering Bride.

GERALD MASSEY

"To My Wife"


Love of country follows from the exercise of its freedoms, not from pride in its fleets or its armies.

LEWIS H. LAPHAM

"Them", Lapham's Quarterly: Foreigners, winter 2014


Mistaking insolence for freedom has always been the hallmark of the slave.

WILHELM REICH

Listen


The supreme end is the freedom of the spirit.

SRI AUROBINDO

Bhagavad Gita and Its Message


The unity of all who dwell in freedom is their only sure defense.

DWIGHT D. EISENHOWER

Second Inaugural Address, Jan. 21, 1957


Unless your freedom turns into a creative realization, you will feel sad. Because you will see that you are free--your chains are broken, and you are no longer in prison; you are standing under the starry night, completely free. But where do you go?

OSHO

Freedom: The Courage to Be Yourself


For every man who lives without freedom, the rest of us must face the guilt.

LILLIAN HELLMAN

The Watch on the Rhine


Freedom is a heavy load, a great and strange burden for the spirit to undertake. It is not easy. It is not a gift given, but a choice made, and the choice may be a hard one. The road goes upward towards the light; but the laden traveler may never reach the end of it.

URSULA K. LE GUIN

The Tombs of Atuan


Freedom is the fundamental condition for any growth.

ERICH FROMM

Escape from Freedom


Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains.

JEAN-JACQUES ROUSSEAU

The Social Contract


The most certain test by which we judge whether a country is really free is the amount of security enjoyed by minorities.

LORD ACTON

The History of Freedom in Antiquity


We know what works: Freedom works. We know what's right: Freedom is right. We know how to secure a more just and prosperous life for man on Earth: through free markets, free speech, free elections, and the exercise of free will unhampered by the state.

GEORGE H. W. BUSH

Inaugural Address, Jan. 20, 1989


Freedom is sometimes defined as a lack of resistance or restraint. A wheel turns freely if there is very little friction in the bearing, a horse breaks free from the post to which it has been tethered, a man frees himself from the branch on which he has been caught while climbing a tree. Physical restraint is an obvious condition, which seems particularly useful in defining freedom, but with respect to important issues, it is a metaphor and not a very good one. People are indeed controlled by fetters, handcuffs, strait jackets, and the walls of jails and concentration camps, but what may be called behavioral control--the restraint imposed by contingencies of reinforcement--is a very different thing.

BURRHUS FREDERIC SKINNER

Beyond Freedom & Dignity


Once a man has tasted freedom, he will never be content to be a slave.

WALT DISNEY

radio address, Mar. 1, 1941