Florence Scovel Shinn Quotes

Absolute liberty is absence of restraint; responsibility is restraint; therefore, the ideally free individual is responsible to himself.

But there is a corollary to freedom and that's personal responsibility, and the real challenge is how you generate that personal responsibility without imposing it.

I would much rather see responsibilities exercised by individuals than have them imposed by the government.

I only have control over what I do.

Between stimulus and response, there is a space where we choose our response.

Liberty, according to my metaphysics is a self-determining power in an intellectual agent. It implies thought and choice and power.

What it lies in our power to do, it lies in our power not to do.

The greatest blessing of our democracy is freedom. But in the last analysis, our only freedom is the freedom to discipline ourselves.

No one is free who does not lord over himself.

I think the real free person in society is one that's disciplined. It's the one that can choose; that is the free one.

The rewards of freedom are always sweet, but its demands are stern, for at its heart is the paradox that the greatest enemy of freedom is freedom.

Everybody has to make their own decisions about how they choose to behave.

To enjoy freedom we have to control ourselves.

When I entered Mexico (City) my own will was the law; I commanded the public force...and who compelled me to divide the powers? Myself, and myself alone, because I thought it was right.

Self Control, Not State Control

Why can't you and I let the world run itself its own way?

For why should my freedom be judged by another’s conscience?

Self regulation is a myth.

Men are not free when they are doing just what they like. The moment you can do just what you like, there is nothing you care about doing.

Freedom is good when the person can use it appropriately. Otherwise it is a disaster.

Under perfectly controlled conditions, man and every other organism behaves as it damn well pleases.

Well you don’t have to do it.

It's a free country. I know we have a lot of regulations in the world right now in what we can and can't do. I would rather our people be responsible and not have to be regulated.

I'd much rather have the freedom, and the obligation to use it responsibly, than be put in a box.

The highest manifestation of life consists in this: that a being governs its own actions. A thing which is always subject to the direction of another is somewhat of a dead thing.