Van Wyck Brooks Quotes

Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.

The secret of freedom lies in educating people, whereas the secret of tyranny is in keeping them ignorant.

There is no slavery but ignorance.

Ignorance has always been the weapon of tyrants; enlightenment the salvation of the free.

Ignorance is an evil weed, which dictators may cultivate among their dupes, but which no democracy can afford among its citizens.

Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the entrails of the last priest.

The glorious spectacle of eighteen millions of people, struggling to burst their chains and be free.

The bounty you must pay for freedom is to give the strength of your arms to put down tyranny. One short hour will deliver our country from the oppressor; and freedom in religion, peace and tranquility, equal laws and an improved country will be the prize.

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.

No people will tamely surrender their Liberties, nor can any be easily subdued, when knowledge is diffused .… On the Contrary, when People are universally ignorant, and debauched in their Manners, they will sink under their own weight without the Aid of foreign Invaders.

The enemies of a people are those who keep them in ignorance.

Knowledge is freedom and ignorance is slavery

There is no slight danger from general ignorance; and the only choice which Providence has graciously left to a vicious government is either to fall by the people, if they are suffered to become enlightened, or with them, if they are kept enslaved and ignorant.

Knowledge unfits a child to be a slave.

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

They who gain applause and power by pandering to the mistakes, the prejudices and passions of the multitude are the enemies of liberty.

The free man cannot be long an ignorant man.

Everywhere that freedom stirs, let tyrants fear.

Education is freedom.

The minds of men are at last aroused; reason looks out and justifies her own, and malice finds all her work is ruin.

Freedom can occur only through education.

There is no doubt that, with the exception of a very small number of people close to a vicious regime, the people of Iraq have been liberated and they understand that they've been liberated.

Dictators and oppressors should continue to fear me because I will be here for a long time.

Knowledge is the most democratic source of power.

America is a friend to the people of Iraq. Our demands are directed only at the regime that enslaves them and threatens us. When these demands are met, the first and greatest benefit will come to Iraqi men, women and children.