“Proclaim Liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof.” ~Leviticus 25:10 (inscribed on The Liberty Bell)

“We on this continent should never forget that men first crossed the Atlantic not to find soil for their ploughs but to secure liberty for their souls.”  ~Robert J. McCracken

“You have rights antecedent to all earthly governments; rights that cannot be repealed or restrained by human laws; rights derived from the Great Legislator of the Universe.” ~John Adams

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”  ~The Declaration of Independence

“I am going to bear my testimony to this assembly, if I never do it again in my life, that those men who laid the foundation of this American government and signed the Declaration of Independence were the best spirits the God of heaven could find on the face of the earth. They were choice spirits, not wicked men. General Washington and all the men that labored for the purpose were inspired of the Lord.” ~Wilford Woodruff (1898)

“I've lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing Proofs I see of this Truth — That God governs in the Affairs of Men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his Notice, is it probable that an Empire can rise without his Aid? We have been assured, Sir, in the Sacred Writings, that except the Lord build the House they labor in vain who build it. I firmly believe this, — and I also believe that without his concurring Aid, we shall succeed in this political Building no better than the Builders of Babel: We shall be divided by our little partial local interests; our Projects will be confounded, and we ourselves shall become a Reproach and Bye word down to future Ages.” ~Benjamin Franklin (at the 1787 Constitutional Convention)

“We, the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity do ordain and establish the Constitution of the United States of America.” ~The Preamble to the Constitution

“Study the constitution! Let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in the legislatures, and enforced by the courts of justice.” ~Abraham Lincoln

“Of all the supervised conditions for life offered man, those under USA’s constitution have proved the best. Wherefore, be sure when you start modifying, corrupting or abrogating it.”  ~Martin H. Fischer

“Miracles do not cluster. Hold on to the Constitution of the United States of America and the Republic for which it stands—what has happened once in six thousand years may never happen again. Hold on to your Constitution, for if the American Constitution shall fail there will be anarchy throughout the world.” ~Daniel Webster

“The liberties of our country, the freedom of our civil Constitution, are worth defending at all hazards; and it is our duty to defend them against all attacks. We have received them as a fair inheritance from our worthy ancestors: they purchased them for us with toil and danger and expense of treasure and blood, and transmitted them to us with care and diligence. It will bring an everlasting mark of infamy on the present generation, enlightened as it is, if we should suffer them to be wrested from us by violence without a struggle, or to be cheated out of them by the artifices of false and designing men.”  ~Samuel Adams

“God grants liberty only to those who love it and are always ready to guard and defend it.” ~Daniel Webster

“Freedom is a fragile thing and is never more than one generation away from extinction. It is not ours by inheritance; it must be fought for and defended constantly by each generation, for it comes only once to a people. Those who have known freedom and then lost it, have never known it again.” ~Ronald Reagan

“No free government, or the blessings of liberty can be preserved to any people, but by frequent recurrence to fundamental principles.” ~George Mason

“A man’s country is not a certain area of land, of mountains, rivers, and woods, but it is a principle; and patriotism is loyalty to that principle.”  ~George William Curtis

“It is the love of country that has lighted and that keeps glowing the holy fire of patriotism.”  ~J. Horace McFarland

“When an American says that he loves his country, he means not only that he loves the New England hills, the prairies glistening in the sun, the wide and rising plains, the great mountains, and the sea.  He means that he loves an inner air, an inner light in which freedom lives and in which a man can draw the breath of self-respect.”  ~Adlai Stevenson

“Love your country. Your country is the land where your parents sleep, where is spoken that language in which the chosen of your heart, blushing, whispered the first word of love; it is the home that God has given you that by striving to perfect yourselves therein you may prepare to ascend to Him.”  ~Giuseppe Mazzini

“America is much more than a geographical fact.  It is a political and moral fact - the first community in which men set out in principle to institutionalize freedom, responsible government, and human equality.”  ~Adlai Stevenson

“Ours is the only country deliberately founded on a good idea.”  ~John Gunther

“The skies of happiness shine upon these United States of America.”  ~Mirakel Reves

“My God! How little do my countrymen know what precious blessings they are in possession of, and which no other people on earth enjoy!”  ~Thomas Jefferson

“How often we fail to realize our good fortune in living in a country where happiness is more than a lack of tragedy.”  ~Paul Sweeney

“Sometimes people call me an idealist. Well, that is the way I know I am an American.  America is the only idealistic nation in the world.”  ~Woodrow Wilson

“There are those, I know, who will say that the liberation of humanity, the freedom of man and mind, is nothing but a dream. They are right. It is the American dream.”  ~Archibald MacLeish

“I believe in America because we have great dreams – and  because we have the opportunity to make those dreams come true.”  ~Wendell L. Wilkie

“America is another name for opportunity. Our whole history appears like a last effort of divine providence on behalf of the human race.”  ~Ralph Waldo Emerson

“May the sun in his course visit no land more free, more happy, more lovely, than this our own country!”  ~Daniel Webster

“This, then, is the state of the union: free and restless, growing and full of hope. So it was in the beginning. So it shall always be, while God is willing, and we are strong enough to keep the faith.”  ~Lyndon B. Johnson

“What we need are critical lovers of America - patriots who express their faith in their country by working to improve it.”  ~Hubert H. Humphrey

“I like to see a man proud of the place in which he lives. I like to see a man live so that his place will be proud of him.”  ~Abraham Lincoln

“If our country is worth dying for in time of war let us resolve that it is truly worth living for in time of peace.”  ~Hamilton Fish

“Patriotism is easy to understand in America - it means looking out for yourself by looking out for your country.”  ~Calvin Coolidge

“This nation will remain the land of the free only so long as it is the home of the brave.”  ~Elmer Davis

“Be convinced that to be happy means to be free and that to be free means to be brave. Therefore do not take lightly the perils of war.” ~Thucydides

“People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.” ~George Orwell

“Our great modern Republic. May those who seek the blessings of its institutions and the protection of its flag remember the obligations they impose.”  ~Ulysses S. Grant

“It is sweet to serve one’s country by deeds, and it is not absurd to serve her by words.”  ~Sallust

“I Pledge Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” ~The Pledge of Allegiance

“It is the flag just as much of the man who was naturalized yesterday as of the men whose people have been here many generations.”  ~Henry Cabot Lodge

“Patriotism consists not in waving the flag, but in striving that our country shall be righteous as well as strong.”  ~James Bryce

“If you are ashamed to stand by your colors, you had better seek another flag.”  ~Author Unknown

“I believe in the United States of America as a Government of the people, by the people, for the people, whose just powers are derived from the consent of the governed; a democracy in a Republic; a sovereign Nation of many sovereign States; a perfect Union, one and inseparable; established upon those principles of freedom, equality, justice, and humanity for which American patriots sacrificed their lives and fortunes. I therefore believe it is my duty to my Country to love it; to support its Constitution; to obey its laws; to respect its flag, and to defend it against all enemies.” ~William Tyler Page

“National honor is national property of the highest value.”  ~James Monroe

“The stern hand of fate has scourged us to an elevation where we can see the great everlasting things that matter for a nation; the great peaks of honour we had forgotten - duty and patriotism, clad in glittering white; the great pinnacle of sacrifice pointing like a rugged finger to heaven.”  ~David Lloyd George

“Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add ‘within the limits of the law’ because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.” ~Thomas Jefferson

“Those who won our independence believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty.”  ~Louis D. Brandeis

“Where liberty dwells, there is my country.”  ~Benjamin Franklin

“Liberty and Union, now and forever, one and inseparable!”  ~Daniel Webster

“The cement of this union is the heart-blood of every American.”  ~Thomas Jefferson

“America is a passionate idea or it is nothing. America is a human brotherhood or it is chaos.”  ~Max Lerner

“What is the essence of America? Finding and maintaining that perfect, delicate balance between freedom ‘to’ and freedom ‘from.’”  ~Marilyn vos Savant

“Each man must for himself alone decide what is right and what is wrong, which course is patriotic and which isn't. You cannot shirk this and be a man. To decide against your conviction is to be an unqualified and excusable traitor, both to yourself and to your country, let men label you as they may.”  ~Mark Twain

“This country will not be a good place for any of us to live in unless we make it a good place for all of us to live in.”  ~Theodore Roosevelt

“He loves his country best who strives to make it best.”  ~Robert G. Ingersoll

“I think there is one higher office than president and I would call that patriot.”  ~Gary Hart

“We can’t all be Washingtons, but we can all be patriots.”  ~Charles F. Browne

“We dare not forget that we are the heirs of that first revolution.”  ~John F. Kennedy

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” ~George Santayana

“Every child in America should be acquainted with his own country. He should read books that furnish him with ideas that will be useful to him in life and practice. As soon as he opens his lips, he should rehearse the history of his own country.” ~Noah Webster, On the Education of Youth in America

“A primary object...should be the education of our youth in the science of government. In a republic, what species of knowledge can be equally important? And what duty more pressing…than…communicating it to those who are to be the future guardians of the liberties of the country?” ~George Washington

“The main hope of a nation lies in the proper education of its youth.” ~Desiderius Erasmus

“Children should be educated and instructed in the principles of freedom.” ~John Adams

“I don’t want my children fed or clothed by the state, but I would prefer that to their being educated by the state.” ~Max Victor Belz

“The school cannot be deprived of its political character as long as it remains a public and compulsory institution.” ~Ludwig von Mises

“The philosophy of the schoolroom in one generation is the philosophy of government in the next.” ~Abraham Lincoln

“To repeat what others have said, requires education; to challenge it, requires brains.” ~Mary Pettibone Poole

“A nation may be ever so civilized and yet lack wisdom.” ~Henry David Thoreau

“We need an America with the wisdom of experience. But we must not let America grow old in spirit.”  ~Hubert H. Humphrey

“[P]atriotism... is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime.”  ~Adlai Stevenson

“The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.” ~Edmund Burke

* * *

Learning for Life: Educational Words of Wisdom contains quotes from our Founding Fathers as well as rare and classic sayings by philosophers, scientists, writers, religious leaders, statesmen, and educators from throughout history. It's a must-have book for concerned parents, teachers, homeschoolers, school reformers, alternative education advocates, unschoolers, speakers, writers, history buffs, lifelong learners, and anyone who believes in educational freedom.

Did you know...? We support the original intent of our Founding Fathers, Free Speech With Responsibility. For free speech links, quotes to consider, and more information about the Green Ribbon "Responsibility in Free Speech" campaign, click here.

“I am willing that every man shall believe what he wishes, print what he wishes, and say what he wishes within his Constitutional rights, but I am not willing...to extend that full and complete freedom into a gross license... to distort and debase the minds and hearts and bodies of those who belong to me and are dearer to me than life itself.” ~J. Reuben Clark

This website is a project of: