Ted Henken Quotes

Men like me, who merely wish to establish political freedom, will in such circumstances lose all their influence, and others will get influence who may become dangerous to all established interests whatsoever.

The so called “Arab Spring” … is really a situation which is creating more threats so far than positive incentives.

We are not to expect to be translated from despotism to liberty in a featherbed.

Yet did that Antiochus, who was also called Dionysius, become an origin of troubles again.

All civilization has from time to time become a thin crust over a volcano of revolution.

Do you trust the government? No? In that case, let’s overthrow it tomorrow.

The Chinese people are not a new kind of human nature. Human nature in China is the same as it is elsewhere. When you start in a tyrannical regime to hand out freedom there is no place to draw that line and expect that line to hold. And so it’s only a matter of time before this regime comes down

Nothing endurable can be produced on a soil soaked with blood and moved by violent agitations.

You don’t go from tyranny to democracy overnight.

When the people contend for their liberty, they seldom get anything by their victory but new masters.

I think this is really a defining moment for the Arab world. The problem is, it is all going to be about blood, sweat and tears. In certain countries it may be just sweat, and in some countries sweat and tears, and in some countries, as you can see, a lot of blood. I think initial instability is something that we are all extremely nervous of.

A State infinitely worse than that which the most inflamed Zealot, the most violent Republican or Enthusiast even pretended to dread before the Rebellion commenced.

I was born in revolution.

You show me a highly unequal society, and I will show you a police state. Or an uprising. There are no counterexamples. None. It's not if, it's when.

Unless something drastic is done very soon, then bloodshed and violence are going to happen…almost inevitably… A people made desperate by despair and injustice and oppression will use desperate means.

Bloody revolutions are solid; bloodless ones are not permanent. But we have shed sufficient blood to come to this revolution. It has been shed not only on battlefields, but within the country…There have been many risings, all of which have been suppressed. Let us hope that there will be no more bloodshed. The first duty of our educated people is to enlighten and guide the opponents of our happy revolution.

Change will always be violent.

Authoritarianism provides a kind of negative stability. Democracy creates space to do a lot of things, sometimes bad things, dangerous things.

Though a revolution may call itself "national," it always marks the victory of a single party.

A thirst for liberty seems to be the ruling passion not only of America but of the present age ... it must work anarchy and confusion.

The altar of liberty totters when it is cemented only with blood

A free Cuba, working for the well-being of the people, was the aim of many of the men who supported Castro, but when it became evident that one tyranny was being supplanted by another some of them began to feel again the urge for the real freedom they had hoped for and fought for. Whereupon, they deserted.

Revolutions of state, many times, make way for new institutions and forms; and often determine in either setting up some tyranny at home, or bringing in some conquest from abroad.

Rebellions broke out, from the full-scale political revolution of Dorr’s rebellion in Rhode Island to urban violence and protest, often by out of work whites taking out their anger on African Americans or Irish Americans. In response, leaders had to come to terms with the role of force in a democracy.

I don't want to take power. I want to break the wall of this autocratic regime.