Freedom Quotes
Presidents are over-represented here. George W. Bush has the most entries, ahead of Thomas Jefferson and John F. Kennedy, which says more about how often presidents talk about freedom than about how well they put it. The better writing tends to be elsewhere: Madison in the Federalist Papers (1787), Hannah Arendt in The Human Condition (1958), Dalí in his diary.
Two of the most repeated freedom quotes are flagged. “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it” is credited to Voltaire. Evelyn Beatrice Hall wrote it in The Friends of Voltaire (1906), as a summary of his views. “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance” is credited to Jefferson, but nobody has found it in his writings. The closest early version is by John Philpot Curran, in a speech of 1790.
If the true spark of religious and civil liberty be kindled, it will burn.
Is freedom dearer than life?
or does it become easier to live
when life becomes difficult?
Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows.
...Fatherland without freedom and merit is a large word with little meaning.
We do not free ourselves from something by avoiding it, but only by living though it.
Lay the proud usurpers low!
Tyrants fall in every foe!
Liberty's in every blow—
Let us do or die!
Freedom is the sure possession of those alone who have the courage to defend it.