William Lloyd Garrison Quotes

The standard of matrimony is erected by affection and purity, and does not depend upon the height, or bulk, or color, or wealth, or poverty of individuals. Water will seek its level; nature will have free course; and heart will answer to heart.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal and hasten the resurrection of the dead.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

I am aware that many object to the severity of my language; but is there not cause for severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject, I do not wish to think, or to speak, or write, with moderation. No! no! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; — but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present. I am in earnest — I will not equivocate — I will not excuse — I will not retreat a single inch — AND I WILL BE HEARD.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

Be faithful, be vigilant, be untiring in your efforts to break every yoke, and let the oppressed go free. Come what may - cost what it may - inscribe on the banner which you unfurl to the breeze, as your religious and political motto - NO COMPROMISE WITH SLAVERY! NO UNION WITH SLAVEHOLDERS

~ William Lloyd Garrison

I am in earnest I will not equivocate I will not excuse I will not retreat a single inch and I will be heard.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

We may be personally defeated, but our principles never!

~ William Lloyd Garrison

The compact which exists between the North and the South is a covenant with death and an agreement with hell.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

Every Fourth of July, our Declaration of Independence is produced, with a sublime indignation, to set forth the tyranny of the mother country and to challenge the admiration of the world. But what a pitiful detail of grievances does this document present in comparison with the wrongs which our slaves endure!

~ William Lloyd Garrison

You can not possibly have a broader basis for government than that which includes all the people, with all their rights in their hands, and with an equal power to maintain their rights.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

I do not believe that God has created us under this dire necessity to toil, like beasts, to sustain life. I believe it is his will that we should hold absolute mastery over time, so as to devote it mainly to intellectual and moral improvement, domestic enjoyment, and social intercourse.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

The success of any great moral enterprise does not depend upon numbers.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

With reasonable men, I will reason; with humane men I will plead; but to tyrants I will give no quarter, nor waste arguments where they will certainly be lost.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

That which is not just is not law.

~ William Lloyd Garrison

Enslave the liberty of but one human being and the liberties of the world are put in peril.

~ William Lloyd Garrison