Quotes About Freedom

You have to have wisdom and knowledge as well as virtue to preserve your rights and liberties.

If I am unhappy, it has been of my own making, and that very thing shows that I can be happy if I will.

He who knows that he is free is free; he who knows that he is bound is bound. What is the end and aim of life? None, because I know that I am the Infinite.

The universe itself can never be the limit of our satisfaction. That is why the miser gathers more and more money, that is why the robber robs, the sinner sins, that is why you are learning philosophy. All have one purpose. There is no other purpose in life, save to reach this freedom. Consciously or unconsciously, we are all striving for perfection. Every being must attain to it.

Sharp as the blade of a razor, long and difficult and hard to cross, is the way to freedom. The sages have declared this again and again. Yet do not let these weaknesses and failures bind you. The Upanishads have declared, "Arise ! Awake ! and stop not until the goal is reached.

Think of your own body, and see that it is strong and healthy; it is the best instrument you have. Think of it as being as strong as adamant, and that with the help of this body you will cross the ocean of life. Freedom is never to be reached by the weak. Throw away all weakness. Tell your body that it is strong, tell your mind that it is strong, and have unbounded faith and hope in yourself. (I. 146) A

if he does not desire any happiness, if he is free of all [attachment], of all fear, of all anger

Think of your own body, and see that it is strong and healthy; it is the best instrument you have. Think of it as being as strong as adamant, and that with the help of this body you will cross the ocean of life. Freedom is never to be reached by the weak. Throw away all weakness. Tell your body that it is strong, tell your mind that it is strong, and have unbounded faith and hope in yourself. (I. 146)

the common saying has it, we think that man "lives to eat" and not "eats to live". We are continually making this mistake; we are regarding nature as ourselves and are becoming attached to it; and as soon as this attachment comes, there is the deep impression on the soul, which binds us down and makes us work not from freedom but like slaves.

the doctrine of non-attachment.

Freedom is to lose all illusions.

you should work like a master and not as a slave; work incessantly, but do not do slave's work.

Misery comes through attachment, not through work.

Whosoever, therefore, asks any one to believe blindly, or drags people behind him by the controlling power of his superior will, does an injury to humanity, though he may not intend it.

Therefore, beware of everything that takes away your freedom. Know that it is dangerous, and avoid it by all the means in your power.

Liberty is the first condition of growth. Just as man must have liberty to think and speak, so he must have liberty in food, dress, and marriage, and in every other thing, so long as he does not injure others. We talk foolishly against material civilisation. The grapes are sour.

When we have succeeded in preventing all the forces in the world from throwing us off our balance, then alone we have attained to freedom, and not before.

Everything that you do under compulsion goes to build up attachment. Why

Therefore we see at once that there cannot be any such thing as free-will; the very words are a contradiction, because will is what we know, and everything that we know is within our universe, and everything within our universe is moulded by conditions of time, space and causality. ... To acquire freedom we have to get beyond the limitations of this universe; it cannot be found here.

To love anyone personally is bondage. Love all alike, then all desires fall off.

Thus the man that has practiced control over himself cannot be acted upon by anything outside; there is no more slavery for him.

To be more free is the goal of all our efforts, for only in perfect freedom can there be perfection.

Forbearance is the highest expression of freedom.

Love never comes until there is freedom