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Liberty, next to religion has been the motive of good deeds and the common pretext of crime...
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Opening statement.

 

John Acton (Lord Acton)

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Stop to consider how the so-called owners of the land got hold of it. They simply seized it by force, afterwards hiring lawyers to provide them with title-deeds. In the case of the enclosure of the common lands, which was going on from about 1600 to 1850, the land-grabbers did not even have the excuse of being foreign conquerors; they were quite frankly taking the heritage of their own countrymen, upon no sort of pretext except that they had the power to do so.

 

George Orwell

 

Liberty is the condition of progress. Without Liberty, there remains only barbarism. Without Liberty, there can be no civilization.
If another man has not the right to think, you have not even the right to think that he thinks wrong. If every man has not the right to think, the people of New Jersey had no right to make a statute, or to adopt a constitution — no jury has the right to render a verdict, and no court to pass its sentence.
In other words, without liberty of thought, no human being has the right to form a judgment. It is impossible that there should be such a thing as real religion without liberty. Without liberty there can be no such thing as conscience, no such word as justice. All human actions — all good, all bad — have for a foundation the idea of human liberty, and without Liberty there can be no vice, and there can be no virtue.
Without Liberty there can be no worship, no blasphemy — no love, no hatred, no justice, no progress.
Take the word Liberty from human speech and all the other words become poor, withered, meaningless sounds — but with that word realized — with that word understood, the world becomes a paradise.

 

Robert G. Ingersoll

 

Never has any one been less a priest than Jesus, never a greater enemy of forms, which stifle religion under the pretext of protecting it. By this we are all his disciples and his successors; by this he has laid the eternal foundation-stone of true religion; and if religion is essential to humanity, he has by this deserved the Divine rank the world has accorded him.

 

Ernest Renan

 

Michael always looked for the good in people, but he also wanted people to understand him, and what he was here for. This made the ridicule he endured so much harder to bear. How can someone who gave so much, be the subject of so much hate? Why is it, the more blessed we are, the tougher our times are destined to be?
My brother wasn’t a threat to anyone. He was at peace, and his peaceful state was a blessing from God. Michael was given the rare talent to entertain, sing and perform. But the true blessing God gave him was the ability to use his talents to do good for others. Michael’s songs inspired us to do better. That was his true gift.
We still feel Michael’s loss. But what will happen as time passes? What will happen to Michael’s real purpose for being? Who can carry on Michael’s work selflessly, without ulterior motive? Nations and governments are capable of good deeds, but those good deeds are too often done to exert control over others. Michael never wanted to control anybody, he only wanted to spread happiness and joy.

 

Michael Jackson

 

The intensive love that humanity has ever known has come from religion, and the most diabolical hatred that humanity has known has also come from religion. No other human motive had deluged the world with blood so much as religion; at the same time, nothing has brought into existence so many hospitals and asylums for the poor; no other human influence has taken such care, not only of humanity, but also the lowest of animals, as religion has done. Nothing makes us so cruel as religion, and nothing makes us so tender as religion.

 

Swami Vivekananda