"When
men are brought face to face with their opponents, forced to listen
and learn and mend their ideas, they cease to be children and savages
and begin to live like civilized men. Then only is freedom a
reality, when men may voice their opinions because they must examine
their opinions."
"Only the consciousness of a purpose that is mightier
than any man and worthy of all men can fortify and inspirit and compose
the souls of men."
"We are all captives of the picture in our head—our
belief that the world we have experienced is the world that really exists."
"When all men think alike, no one thinks very much."
"A man has honor if he holds himself to an ideal
of conduct though it is inconvenient, unprofitable, and dangerous to
do so."
"Every fairly intelligent person is aware that the
price of respectability is a muffled soul bent on the trivial and the
mediocre."
"In a free society the state does not administer
the affairs of men. It administers justice among men who conduct their
own affairs."
"Most men, after a little freedom, have preferred
authority with the consoling assurances and the economy of effort it
brings."
"The unexamined life, said Socrates, is unfit to
be lived by man. This is the virtue of liberty, and the ground on which
we may justify our belief in it, that it tolerates error in order to
serve truth."
"The study of error is not only in the highest degree
prophylactic, but it serves as a stimulating introduction to the study
of truth."
"The best servants of the people, like the best valets,
must whisper unpleasant truths in the master's ear. It is the court
fool, not the foolish courtier, whom the king can least afford to lose."
"The war for liberty never ends. . . . he only has
known the full joy of living who somewhere and at some time has struck
a decisive blow for the freedom of the human spirit."
"While the right to talk may be the beginning of
freedom, the necessity of listening is what makes that right important."
"We must protect the right of our opponents to speak
because we must hear what they have to say."
"Whereas each man claims his freedom as a matter
of right, the freedom he accords to other men is a matter of toleration."
"The truth will emerge from free discussion."
"The moralist cannot teach what is revealed; he must
reveal what can be taught. He has to seek insight rather than to preach."
"It requires wisdom to understand wisdom: the music
is nothing if the audience is deaf."