Quotes · Skopia

18 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

1776

★ 10.0

Political literature

The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for among old parchments or musty records. They are written, as with a sunbeam, in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power.

Alexander Hamilton

New-York Gazetteer · 1775

★ 5.2

Novel

There is no such thing as "natural law": this expression is nothing but old nonsense…Prior to laws, what is natural is only the strength of the lion, or the need of the creature suffering from hunger or cold, in short, need.

Stendhal

The Red and the Black · 1819

★ 3.6

Speech · Political speech

There is but one law for all, namely, that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity, — the Law of Nature and of Nations.

Edmund Burke

1794

★ 3.5

Philosophical literature

There are two sorts of laws, those of absolute equity and universality, and the bizarre ones which owe their autonomy only to blindness or to the force of circumstance. The latter merely cover the man who is breaking them with a passing disgrace, which time then transfers to the judges and the nations, on whom it remains forever.

Denis Diderot

1805

★ 3.5

Speech

Right knows no boundaries, and justice no frontiers; the brotherhood of man is not a domestic institution.

Learned Hand

1945

★ 3.5

Political literature

The God who gave us life, gave us liberty at the same time.

Thomas Jefferson

A Summary View of the Rights of British America · 1774

★ 2.2

Treatise · Political literature

Man...has by nature a power...to preserve his property—that is, his life, liberty, and estate—against the injuries and attempts of other men.

John Locke

Two Treatises of Government · 1690

★ 2.1

Political debate

There is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights enumerated in the Declaration of Independence, the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Abraham Lincoln

Lincoln-Douglas Debates · 1858

★ 2.1

Philosophical literature

Two things fill the mind with ever new and increasing wonder and awe, the more often and the more seriously reflection concentrates upon them: the starry heaven above me and the moral law within me.

Immanuel Kant

Critique of Practical Reason · 1788

★ 2.0

Speech · Political speech

And yet the same revolutionary beliefs for which our forebears fought are still at issue around the globe—the belief that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the state but from the hand of God.

John F. Kennedy

Inaugural Address of John F. Kennedy · 1961

★ 2.0

Speech

The slave trade is contrary to the laws of God and to the rights of men.

David Hartley (the Younger)

1776

★ 1.9

Political literature

Natural rights is simple nonsense: natural and imprescriptible rights, rhetorical nonsense,—nonsense upon stilts.

Jeremy Bentham

1832

★ 1.9

Speech · Political speech

We admit of no government by divine right, believing that so far as power is concerned the Beneficent Creator has made no distinction amongst men; that all are upon an equality, and that the only legitimate right to govern is an express grant of power from the governed.

William Henry Harrison

Inaugural Address of William Henry Harrison · 1841

★ 1.9

Speech

Wherever there is a human being, I see God-given rights inherent in that being, whatever may be the sex or complexion.

William Lloyd Garrison

1853

★ 1.9

Essay · Political literature

Every man, when he comes to be sensible of his natural rights, and to feel his own importance, will consider himself as fully equal to any other person whatever.

Joseph Priestley

1768

★ 1.8

Political literature

That all men are by nature equally free and independent, and have certain inherent rights, of which, when they enter into a state of society, they cannot by any compact deprive or divest their posterity; namely, the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.

George Mason

Virginia Bill of Rights · 1776

★ 1.8

Novel

We may brave human laws, but we cannot resist natural ones.

Jules Verne

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea · 1870

★ 1.2

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