Anti-nothing, pro-LIBERTY

“LIBERATUS”: one who has been set free. Which, let us admit, does not happen every day.

Manifesto

I am against nothing. Well, almost: as you will see further down, the list of “almosts” has grown somewhat longer over the years. Let us say that I am for one thing, and that the rest follows from it: LIBERTY. The liberty to think, to speak, to undertake, to believe or not to believe, and to keep the fruit of one's labour without having to surrender it anew at some counter or other.

If this site sometimes seems to say “no”, it is out of sheer courtesy to the “yes” that follows: yes to responsibility, yes to fair debate, yes to those old masters who taught us that LIBERTY does not arrive by post; it is cultivated, like a garden, with patience and the occasional snip of the secateurs.

Herein you will find neither invective nor calumny: ideas, sources, verified quotations. The reader remains the judge. He is, moreover, the only judge whose verdict I accept without appeal.

Quote of the day

“He who seeks freedom for anything but freedom's self is made to be a slave.”

« Qui cherche dans la liberté autre chose qu’elle-même est fait pour servir. »

Alexis de Tocqueville, The Old Regime and the Revolution, book III, chapter 3 (1856), trans. John Bonner, Harper & Brothers, 1856, p. 204 · Source: original on Wikisource

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    Philosophy

    The great minds of LIBERTY, quoted to the very comma. They need no help from us.

    Read

    Ideas

    Collectivism, wokeism and taxation: three light topics for the end of a dinner party.

    Reflect

    Tributes

    Dalí, Buzzati, Camus and Allen: the moustache, the sentry, the sense of measure and the clarinet; four ways of being free.

    Salute

    Bill Shankly

    Football, humour and high standards. In the spirit of Shankly.

    Come in

    Spirituality

    Knights, builders and set squares. Voices are lowered here, and hats removed.

    Explore

    “Resolve to serve no more, and you are at once freed.”

    « Soyez résolus de ne servir plus, et vous voilà libres. »