40 Empowering Freedom Quotes That Drive Meaningful Change
“Freedom“, by Josef Grunig, licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0
Freedom means the power to speak, think and act as one wants. We all deserve freedom, don’t we? It’s our birthright to have equal opportunities in life. Freedom allows us to make our own decisions and choose the direction we want to move.
While most of us have the liberty to choose where we want to live, what we want to eat, there are many who have to fight for these fundamental rights.
Here, we have collected some of the finest quotes about freedom from famous celebrities, authors, philosophers, politicians, and freedom fighters.
Freedom Quotes
“Stand for what’s right. Make your life beautiful. Make your life meaningful.”
Maxime Lagacé
“A man who believes in freedom will do anything under the sun to acquire, or preserve his freedom.”
Malcolm X (1992), “By any means necessary”, Pathfinder Pr
“The only real prison is fear, and the only real freedom is freedom from fear.”
Aung San Suu Kyi
“No one outside ourselves can rule us inwardly. When we know this, we become free.”
Buddha
“I know but one freedom and that is the freedom of the mind.”
Antoine de Saint-Exupery
“Freedom is the will to be responsible to ourselves.”
Friedrich Nietzsche, Sect. 38. – Twilight of the Idols (1888)
“The freedom from something is not true freedom. The freedom to do anything you want to do is also not the freedom I am talking about. My vision of freedom is to be yourself.”
Osho
“Liberty is the first condition of growth.”
“Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn’t pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same.”
Ronald Reagan, Labour Day Address at Liberty State Park, delivered 1 September 1980, Jersey City, New Jersey
“The highest sign of inner freedom is when you no longer want to change the present moment.”
Maxime Lagacé
“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.”
Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.”
George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four pt. 1, ch. 1 (1949)
“Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.”
Mahatma Gandhi, Teachings of Mahatma Gandhi
“People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use.”
Soren Kierkegaard
“Better to die fighting for freedom than be a prisoner all the days of your life.”
Bob Marley
“I’m not fighting for justice. I am not fighting for freedom. I am fighting for my life and another day in the world here.”
“The fight for freedom must go on until it is won; until our country is free and happy and peaceful as part of the community of man, we cannot rest.” –
Oliver Tambo, Letter From Dar Es-Salaam to E.S. Reddy, www.sahistory.org.za. January 17, 1967
“More than anything else, let me be clear – we need to be willing to fight for freedom, and free markets, and traditional moral values. That’s what the American people want to see this movement and this party return to.”
Mike Pence, “Biography/Personal Quotes”
“If I fall, I will fall five-feet four-inches forward in the fight for freedom.”
Fannie Lou Hamer
“The greatest crime in the world is not developing your potential. When you do what you do best, you are helping not only yourself but the world.”
Roger Williams
“I’m still convinced. We all fight for freedom, but the foundation of freedom is equality and justice. And we are all on the road.”
Evo Morales, Interview with David Hirschman, bigthink.com. September 22, 2010
“I don’t think the only place to fight for freedom is in the halls of Congress.” –
Malcolm Wallop, Wyoming’s Senator Wallop Won’t Run in ’94”, www.nytimes.com. 1993
“May we think of freedom, not as the right to do as we please, but as the opportunity to do what is right.”
Peter Marshall, Life, Liberty & the Pursuit of Happiness: An American Muslim Perspective” by Zainab Chaudry, www.huffpost.com. July 4, 2016
“Financial freedom is available to those who learn about it and work for it.”
“Freedom is a struggle, and we do it together. Not only together as black citizens, but black and white together.”
Andrew Young
“Freedom is that instant between when someone tells you to do something, and when you decide how to respond.”
Jeffrey Borenstein
“Love does not claim possession, but gives freedom.”
Rabindranath Tagore
“Those who deny freedom to others deserve it not for themselves.”
Abraham Lincoln, Letter to H. L. Pierce and others [April 6,1859]
“We have enjoyed so much freedom for so long that we are perhaps in danger of forgetting how much blood it cost to establish the Bill of Rights.”
Felix Frankfurter
“Instead of trying to make your life perfect, give yourself the freedom to make it an adventure, and go ever upward.”
Drew Houston, Drew Houston’s Commencement Address at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, news.mit.edu. June 7, 2013
“There are two freedoms – the false, where a man is free to do what he likes; the true, where he is free to do what he ought.”
Charles Kingsley, Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895) edited by Josiah Hotchkiss Gilbert, p. 377
“There must be freedom for all to live, to think, to worship, no book, no avenue must be closed.”
“If we don’t believe in freedom of expression for people we despise, we don’t believe in it at all.”
Noam Chomsky, What Liberals Believe: Thousands of Quotes on why America
“We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it.”
William Faulkner, The segregation decisions (ed. 1956)
“I’m a big advocate of freedom: freedom of speech, freedom of expression, freedom of thought.”
Jimmy Wales
“It is easy to believe in freedom of speech for those with whom we agree.”
Leo McKern
“The greatest gifts you can give your children are the roots of responsibility and the wings of independence.”
Denis Waitley
“Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility.”
Sigmund Freud, Personal Quotes/ Biography
“Freedom is not an unlimited license, an unlimited choice, or an unlimited opportunity. Freedom is, first of all, a responsibility before the God from whom we come.”
Alan Keyes
“The more freedom we enjoy, the greater the responsibility we bear, toward others as well as ourselves.”
Freedom and liberty are fundamental human rights that keep every citizen happy. These quotes about freedom will definitely motivate you to attempt to reach a state of full freedom and liberty.
If you liked reading these quotes on freedom, you might also enjoy reading 38 Quotes by Nelson Mandela on Success and Education.
Great post. I no longer take freedom for granted.
Thank you Michigan!