Charles Dickens on liberty

I will honor Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year.

I have always thought of Christmas time as a good time. A kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time. The only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely.

A loving heart is the truest wisdom.

The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.

Thomas Jefferson1743–1826Letter to William Stephens Smith (13 November 1787). Manuscript at the Library of Congress.

• War & Peace

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.

Benjamin Franklin1706–1790This was first used by Franklin for the Pennsylvania Assembly in its “Reply to the Governor” (November 11, 1755) Reply to the Governor

Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.

Benjamin Franklin1706–1790