Inspirational Quotes on Liberty

“The moment any mention is made of Christian liberty lust begins to boil, or insane commotions arise, if a speedy restraint is not laid on those licentious spirits by whom the best things are perverted into the worst.”

“However many blessings we expect from God, His infinite liberality will always exceed all our wishes and our thoughts.”

“Wherefore, though the Christian, as a Christian, is the only man at liberty, as called thereunto of God; yet his liberty is limited to things that are good: he is not licensed thereby to indulge the flesh.”

“It is the greatest and dearest blessing that ever God gave to men, that they may repent; and therefore to deny or to delay it is to refuse health when brought by the skill of the physician - to refuse liberty offered to us by our gracious Lord.”

“On the essentials, unity. On the nonessentials, liberty. In everything, charity.”

“Law represents the effort of man to organize society; governments, the efforts of selfishness to overthrow liberty.”

“The real democratic American idea is, not that every man shall be on a level with every other man, but that every man shall have liberty to be what God made him, without hindrance.”

“Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have.”

“If we mean to support the liberty and independence which have cost us so much blood and treasure to establish, we must drive far away the demon of party spirit and local reproach.”

“Interwoven is the love of liberty with every ligament of the heart.”

“Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth.”

“Republicanism is not the phantom of a deluded imagination. On the contrary, under no form of government are laws better supported, liberty and property better secured, or happiness more effectually dispensed to mankind.”

“There is an opinion that parties in free countries are useful checks upon the administration of the government, and serve to keep alive the spirit of liberty. This, within certain limits, is probably true. But in governments of a popular character, and purely elective, it is a spirit not to be encouraged. From their natural tendency, there will always be enough of that spirit for every salutary purpose. And there being constant danger of excess, the effort ought to be, by force of public opinion, to mitigate and assuage it. A fire not to be quenched, it demands a uniform vigilance to prevent it bursting into a flame, lest, instead of warming, it should consume.”

“Over grown military establishments are under any form of government inauspicious to liberty, and are to be regarded as particularly hostile to republican liberty.”

“It will be found an unjust and unwise jealousy to deprive a man of his natural liberty upon the supposition he may abuse it.”

“Firearms are second only to the Constitution in importance; they are the peoples' liberty's teeth.”

“Free will is not the liberty to do whatever one likes, but the power of doing whatever one sees ought to be done, even in the very face of otherwise overwhelming impulse. There lies freedom, indeed.”

“The truth is, of course, that the curtness of the Ten Commandments is an evidence, not of the gloom and narrowness of a religion, but, on the contrary, of its liberality and humanity. It is shorter to state the things forbidden than the things permitted: precisely because most things are permitted, and only a few things are forbidden.”

“False notions of liberty are strangely common. People talk of it as if it meant the liberty of doing whatever one likes - whereas the only liberty that a man, worthy of the name of man, ought to ask for, is, to have all restrictions, inward and outward, removed that prevent his doing what he ought.”

“A principle is one thing; a maxim or rule is another. A principle requires liberality; a rule says, "one tenth." A principle says, "forgive"; a rule defines "seven times."”