The Quotes canon
Sourced and curated.
Every quote has been curated by hand and carefully authenticated.
Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Political literature31 quotes
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. — Declaration of Independence · 1776Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. — Jean-Jacques Rousseau · 1762The basis of a democratic state is liberty. — Aristotle · 350 BCThose who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. — Benjamin Franklin · 1755A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for...is a miserable creature, who has no chance of being free. — John Stuart Mill · 1862Freedom is always freedom for the one who thinks differently. — Rosa Luxemburg · 1919All 31 quotes →Political speech21 quotes
The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion. — Edmund Burke · 1784A free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular. — Adlai Stevenson · 1952We look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression-everywhere in the world. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way-everywhere in the world. The third is freedom from want... Everywhere in the world. The fourth is freedom from fear... Anywhere in the world. — Franklin D. Roosevelt · 1941Necessity is the plea for every infringement of human freedom: it is the argument of tyrants; it is the creed of slaves. — William Pitt, Earl of Chatham · 1783The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance; which condition if he break, servitude is at once the consequence of his crime, and the punishment of his guilt. — John Philpot Curran · 1816Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. — Ronald Reagan · 1961All 21 quotes →Philosophical literature16 quotes
Man is born free; and everywhere he is in chains. — Jean-Jacques Rousseau · 1762I am condemned to be free. — Jean-Paul Sartre · 1943The basis of a democratic state is liberty. — Aristotle · 350 BCAnxiety is the dizziness of freedom. — Soren Kierkegaard · 1844A man who has nothing which he is willing to fight for...is a miserable creature, who has no chance of being free. — John Stuart Mill · 1862The most perfect of all works of art is true political freedom. — Friedrich Schiller · 1794All 16 quotes →Historical literature6 quotes
Happiness depends on being free, and freedom depends on being courageous. — Pericles · 430 BCFreedom is always freedom for the one who thinks differently. — Rosa Luxemburg · 1919Despots themselves do not deny that freedom is excellent; only they desire it for themselves alone, and they maintain that everyone else is altogether unworthy of it. — Alexis de Tocqueville · 1856O liberty! O liberty! What crimes are committed in thy name! — Alphonse de Lamartine · 1793How strongly does this bear out the truth of Plato's maxim, that he who wishes to be really rich ought to lessen his desires rather than increase his property, because if a man places no bounds to his covetousness, he never will be free from want and misery. — PlutarchFreedom alone substitutes from time to time for the love of material comfort more powerful and more lofty passions; it alone supplies ambition with greater objectives than the acquisition of riches, and creates the light that makes it possible to see and to judge the vices and virtues of mankind. — Alexis de Tocqueville · 1856Drama5 quotes
Thus sayeth the Lord God of Israel: "Let my people go!" — Moses · 1956It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything. — Tyler Durden · 1999I have to remind myself that some birds aren’t meant to be caged. — Ellis Boyd 'Red' Redding · 1994Oh, yeah, they're gonna talk to you, and talk to you, and talk to you about individual freedom. But they see a free individual, it's gonna scare 'em. — George Hanson · 1969But only in their dreams can men be truly free. 'Twas always thus, and always thus will be. — John Keating · 1989Drama (film)5 quotes
Thus sayeth the Lord God of Israel: "Let my people go!" — Moses · 1956It's only after we've lost everything that we're free to do anything. — Tyler Durden · 1999I have to remind myself that some birds aren’t meant to be caged. — Ellis Boyd 'Red' Redding · 1994Oh, yeah, they're gonna talk to you, and talk to you, and talk to you about individual freedom. But they see a free individual, it's gonna scare 'em. — George Hanson · 1969But only in their dreams can men be truly free. 'Twas always thus, and always thus will be. — John Keating · 1989Legal writing4 quotes
The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding. — Louis Brandeis · 1928The history of liberty has largely been the history of observance of procedural safeguards. — Felix Frankfurter · 1943Of that freedom one may say that it is the matrix, the indispensable condition, of nearly every other form of freedom. — Benjamin Cardozo · 1937Those who won our independence believed that the final end of the State was to make men free to develop their faculties; and that in its government the deliberative forces should prevail over the arbitrary. They valued liberty both as an end and as a means. They believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty. — Louis Brandeis · 1927Economic literature3 quotes
History suggests only that capitalism is a necessary condition for political freedom. Clearly it is not a sufficient condition. — Milton Friedman · 1962The system of private property is the most important guaranty of freedom, not only for those who own property, but scarcely less for those who do not. — Friedrich Hayek · 1944Freedom in economic arrangements is itself a component of freedom broadly understood, so economic freedom is an end in itself...economic freedom is also an indispensable means toward the achievement of political freedom. — Milton Friedman · 1962Religious literature3 quotes
Leave all things behind, and come unto me for thy salvation. I will make thee free from this bondage of sins. Fear no more. — Bhagavad Gita · 200 BCThen you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. — Jesus · 90Let my people go. — God · 1405 BCAutobiography and memoir2 quotes
I am not truly free if I am taking away someone else's freedom, just as surely as I am not free when my freedom is taken away from me. The oppressed and the oppressor alike are robbed of their humanity. — Nelson Mandela · 1994Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms-to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way. — Viktor Frankl · 1946Dystopian fiction2 quotes
The choice for mankind lies between freedom and happiness, and that, for the great bulk of mankind, happiness is better. — George Orwell · 1949Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows. — George Orwell · 1949Epic2 quotes
Thus sayeth the Lord God of Israel: "Let my people go!" — Moses · 1956All men lose when they die and all men die. But a slave and a free man lose different things. — Spartacus · 1960Epic (film)2 quotes
Thus sayeth the Lord God of Israel: "Let my people go!" — Moses · 1956All men lose when they die and all men die. But a slave and a free man lose different things. — Spartacus · 1960Biography1 quote
How strongly does this bear out the truth of Plato's maxim, that he who wishes to be really rich ought to lessen his desires rather than increase his property, because if a man places no bounds to his covetousness, he never will be free from want and misery. — PlutarchComedy drama1 quote
Liberty's too precious a thing to be buried in books, Miss Saunders. Men should hold it up in front of them every single day of their lives and say: I'm free to think and to speak. My ancestors couldn't, I can, and my children will. Boys ought to grow up remembering that. — Jefferson Smith · 1939Comedy drama (film)1 quote
Liberty's too precious a thing to be buried in books, Miss Saunders. Men should hold it up in front of them every single day of their lives and say: I'm free to think and to speak. My ancestors couldn't, I can, and my children will. Boys ought to grow up remembering that. — Jefferson Smith · 1939Coming of age story1 quote
I am no bird; and no net ensnares me; I am a free human being with an independent will. — Charlotte Bronte · 1847Commencement address1 quote
It's worth remembering this: freedom of expression sustains all the other freedoms we enjoy. — Ian McEwan · 2015Country music1 quote
Freedom is just another word for nothin' left to lose. — Janis Joplin · 1971Dissenting opinion1 quote
The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding. — Louis Brandeis · 1928Feminist literature1 quote
There is no gate, no lock, no bolt that you can set upon the freedom of my mind. — Virginia Woolf · 1929Historical drama1 quote
All men lose when they die and all men die. But a slave and a free man lose different things. — Spartacus · 1960Historical drama (film)1 quote
All men lose when they die and all men die. But a slave and a free man lose different things. — Spartacus · 1960Political1 quote
Liberty's too precious a thing to be buried in books, Miss Saunders. Men should hold it up in front of them every single day of their lives and say: I'm free to think and to speak. My ancestors couldn't, I can, and my children will. Boys ought to grow up remembering that. — Jefferson Smith · 1939Political (film)1 quote
Liberty's too precious a thing to be buried in books, Miss Saunders. Men should hold it up in front of them every single day of their lives and say: I'm free to think and to speak. My ancestors couldn't, I can, and my children will. Boys ought to grow up remembering that. — Jefferson Smith · 1939Political writing1 quote
The boisterous sea of liberty indeed is never without a wave. — Thomas Jefferson · 1820Prison drama1 quote
I have to remind myself that some birds aren’t meant to be caged. — Ellis Boyd 'Red' Redding · 1994Prison drama (film)1 quote
I have to remind myself that some birds aren’t meant to be caged. — Ellis Boyd 'Red' Redding · 1994Road movie1 quote
Oh, yeah, they're gonna talk to you, and talk to you, and talk to you about individual freedom. But they see a free individual, it's gonna scare 'em. — George Hanson · 1969Superhero1 quote
Freedom is life's great lie. Once you accept that, in your heart, you will know peace. — Loki · 2012