Nothing strengthens authority so much as silence.

I have said that the Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation’s destiny; so, indeed, I regard it. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost.

I rebel; therefore I exist.

You must love in such a way that the person you love feels free.

If we are to achieve richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in which each diverse human gift will find a fitting place.

Man is a mental being, and to know this is the first step on the road to freedom, for as long as you believe yourself to be primarily physical, you will remain in bondage, that is to say, to your own habits of thought, for there is no other bondage.

The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion.

The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.

Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!

Wherever there is injustice, war, discrimination against women, gays and the disadvantaged, I did my best to show up and exert moral persuasion.

The necessity of the times, more than ever, calls for our utmost circumspection, deliberation, fortitude and perseverance.

Some people’s idea of free speech is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone says anything back, that is an outrage.

If art is to nourish the roots of our culture, society must set the artist free to allow his vision wherever it takes him.

Man’s goodness is a flame that can be hidden but never extinguished.

Never complain of that of which it is at all times in your power to rid yourself.

He who blames others has a long way to go on his journey. He who blames himself is halfway there. He who blames no one has arrived.

Surely what a man does when he is in an uncomfortable situation is the best evidence for the sort of man he is.

I have endured a great deal of ridicule without much malice; and have received a great deal of kindness, not quite free from ridicule. I am used to it.

When you see that in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing - When you see that money is flowing to those who deal, not in goods, butt in favors - When you see that men get richer by graft and by pull than by work, and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you - When you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice - You may know that your society is doomed.

In all negotiations of difficulty, a man may not look to sow and reap at once; but must prepare business, and so ripen it by degrees.

Benevolence, righteousness, propriety, and knowledge are not infused into us from without.

One of the tests of leadership is the ability to recognize a problem before it becomes an emergency.

Some people are so used to special treatment that equal treatment is considered to be discrimination.

A primary object should be the education of our youth in the science of government. In a republic, what species of knowledge can be equally important? And what duty more pressing than communicating it to those who are to be the future guardians of the liberties of the country.

Statism needs war; a free country does not. Statism survives by looting; a free country survives by producing.

If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace, and this single reflection, well applied, is sufficient to awaken every man to duty.

If liberty and equality, as is thought by some, are chiefly two be found in democracy, they will be best attained when all persons alike share in the government to the utmost.

The liberties of a people never were, nor ever will be, secure when the transactions of their rulers may be concealed from them.

Freedom of men under government is to have a standing rule to live by, common to every one of that society, and made by the legislative power vested in it; a liberty to follow my own will in all things when the rule prescribes not, and not to be subject to the inconstant, uncertain, unknown, arbitrary rule of another man.

I prefer liberty with danger than peace with slavery.

The shepherd drives the wolf from the sheep’s throat, for which the sheep thanks the shepherd as his liberator, while the wolf denounces him for the same act. . . . Plainly the sheep and the wolf are not agreed upon the definition of liberty.

The most effective way to destroy people is to deny and obliterate their own understanding of their history.

If by the mere force of numbers a majority should deprive a minority of any clearly written constitutional right, it might, in a moral point of view, justify revolution—certainly would if such a right were a vital one.

I shall work for the Republican party and call on all women to join me, precisely…for what that party has done and promises to do for women, nothing more, nothing less.

All tyrannies rule through fraud and force, but once the fraud is exposed they must rely exclusively on force.