Quotes About Independence

Siempre estamos solos. Nacemos solos. Morimos solos. ¿Qué más da?

My job is to help you get into the world, but you do not belong to me.

I learned a long time ago … you can't live other people's lives. We have to make our own decisions, even if we're wrong.

national self-determination ("no right anywhere exists to hand peoples from sovereignty as if they were property")

Diogenes's quick wit and, dare we say it, cynical outlook disguised a first-class intellect focused on proving a single principle: that we have to own nothing, absolutely nothing, to be truly free.

love of independence and property, the most steady and industrious of all human appetites." Commercial society supplies that "love of independence" in abundance.

love of independence and property, the most steady and industrious of all human appetites." Commercial society supplies that "love of independence" in abundance. It encourages men to overturn custom and tradition, and establish a new kind of law, based on a free circulation of goods and services.

Du Bois brought back a phrase he had coined in 1922, "Africa for Africans": "Hereafter it will no longer be ruled by might nor by power, by invading armies nor police, but by the spirit of all its gods and the wisdom of its prophets."76

ornery enough that they will not stay where the rule was laid down. In that I believe you will find the greatest hope for America's future. —William S. Knudsen

It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner

If these words have a familiar sound, it is because they are not from Ockham or Gerson, but from Thomas Jefferson. They come from the most influential summary of medieval conciliarist doctrine in its secular form: the American Declaration of Independence.

Italy's cities had been left largely to govern themselves since the Dark Ages.

The coming of the Crusades had made them rich as well as independent

This was why the ancient Athenians had defied the tyranny of Persia against all odds. This was why the early Romans had risked everything to overthrow their kings, so that they could live free or die. And that was why the Florentines had to be ready to die to defend their liberty, Leonardo Bruni concluded—because without liberty, "life [has] no meaning for them.

In truth, a good master mason could build an entire Gothic cathedral with just a compass and a T square, a device he borrowed from Greek mathematicians for lining up perfect vertical and horizontal lines. This dazzling command of practical geometry made the cathedral builders of the Middle Ages truly independent businessmen. By the fourteenth century, they were already calling themselves free masons.

Liberty included an equality before the law, since all men are equal before God; and it included a generosity of spirit and independence of mind that Aristotle had recognized as the hallmark of the virtuous man and which Locke saw would prevent a state of normal liberty from degenerating into a "state of license"—in other words, a perpetual riot.

Then honor to the day that gave him birth, For it is also Freedom's natal day.

The real problem of leisure time is how to keep others from using yours.

I think it's a mistake to ever look for hope outside of one's self.

If I have to be alone I want to be by myself.

You break From earthly approval And common urges: Then soar, accordingly

He who does not enjoy solitude will not love freedom.

A man can be himself only so long as he is alone; and if he does not love solitude, he will not love freedom; for it is only when he is alone that he is really free.

Great men are like eagles, and build their nest on some lofty solitude