Benjamin Rush Quotes
Freedom can exist only in the society of knowledge.
Benjamin Rush, 1745-1813, Physician & member of the Continental Congress, Surgeon General of the Continental Army and Treasurer of the U.S. Mint, Education Agreeable to a Republican Form of Government
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The societies that had regularly produced the great advances in the sciences were those that allowed its citizens much liberty—liberty of thought, expression, association, etc. Where religious dogma controlled thought and expression, great scientific achievements were far less probable or less productive. Imagine, what Galileo might have achieved if the Church had not curtailed his efforts. When Islamic society was open, the sciences flourished whereas they were stifled in Christian Europe, but once Islam closed and liberty was no more, Islamic science degenerated to its low point of the 21st century.
Actually, in the modern English tradition there is no censorship of library materials, but for many countries including some democracies, there is library censorship including some in the United States. However, the Internet has become the most democratic as government censorship is even harder, but still China, Saudi Arabia, and some other countries even censor the Internet.
Benjamin Rush was a signer of the United States Declaration of Independence and a civic leader in Philadelphia, where he was a physician, politician, social reformer, humanitarian, and educator and the founder of Dickinson College. Rush attended the Continental Congress. His later self-description there was: "He aimed right." He served as Surgeon General of the Continental Army and became a professor of chemistry, medical theory, and clinical practice at the University of Pennsylvania.
