Liberty has never come from the government. Liberty has always come from the subjects of government. The history of liberty is the history of resistance. The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of governmental power, not the increase of it: Woodrow Wilson

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The average age of the world's greatest civilizations has been two hundred years.
These nations have progressed through this sequence:
From bondage to spiritual faith;
from spiritual faith to great courage;
from courage to liberty;
from liberty to abundance;
from abundance to selfishness;
from selfishness to complacency;
from complaceny to apathy;
from apathy to dependence;
from dependency back again into bondage.
Sir Alex Fraser Tyler: (1742-1813) Scottish jurist and historian

"Freethinkers are those who are willing to use their minds without prejudice and without fearing to understand things that clash with their customs, privileges, or beliefs. This state of mind is not common, but it is essential for right thinking; where it is absent, discussion is apt to become worse than useless." -- Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoi - (1828-1910) Russian writer Source: On Life and Essays on Religion

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"Free inquiry requires that we tolerate diversity of opinion and that we respect the right of individuals to express their beliefs, however unpopular they may be, without social or legal prohibition or fear of success." -- Paul Kurtz "A Secular Humanist Declaration," in On The Barricades, 1989

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"This is, in theory, still a free country, but our politically correct, censorious times are such that many of us tremble to give vent to perfectly acceptable views for fear of condemnation. Freedom of speech is thereby imperiled, big questions go undebated, and great lies become accepted, unequivocally as great truths." -- Simon Heffer : Daily Mail, 7 June 2000

"There is no flag large enough to cover the shame of killing innocent people." : U.S. historian Howard Zinn, 1993

" I hope our wisdom will grow with our power, and teach us, that the less we use our power the greater it will be." Thomas Jefferson:

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"There is nothing to fear except the persistent refusal to find out the truth, the persistent refusal to analyze the causes of happenings." Dorothy Thompson:

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" As scarce as truth is, the supply has always been in excess of the demand." Josh Billings

The Roots of Violence:

Wealth without work,
Pleasure without conscience,
Knowledge without character,
Commerce without morality,
Science without humanity,
Worship without sacrifice,
Politics without principles.
Mohandas K. Gandhi