Lucretia Mott Quotes & Sayings

Those who go forth ministering to the wants and necessities of their fellow beings experience a rich return, their souls being as a watered garden, and a spring that faileth not — Lucretia Mott

Liberty is not less a blessing, because oppression has so long darkened the mind that it can not appreciate it. — Lucretia Mott

Any great change must expect opposition, because it shakes the very foundation of privilege. — Lucretia Mott

Man is not by nature a tyrant, but becomes a tyrant by power conferred on him. — Lucretia Mott

Let woman then go on-not asking favors, but claiming as a right the removal of all hindrances to her elevation in the scale of being-let her receive encouragement for the proper cultivation of all her powers, so that she may enter profitably into the active business of life. — Lucretia Mott

The likeness we bear to Jesus is more essential than our notions of him. — Lucretia Mott

If our principles are right, why should we be cowards? — Lucretia Mott

The legal theory is, that marriage makes the husband and wife one person, and that person is the husband. — Lucretia Mott

The Law has made the man and wife one person, and that one person the husband! — Lucretia Mott

Let our lives be in accordiance with our convictions of right, each striving to carry out our principles — Lucretia Mott

There is a broad distinction between religion and theology. The one is a natural, human experience common to all well-organized minds. The other is a system of speculations about the unseen and the unknowable, which the human mind has no power to grasp or explain, and these speculations vary with every sect, age, and type of civilization. No one knows any more of what lies beyond our sphere of action than thou and I, and we know nothing. — Lucretia Mott

In the true married relationship, the independence of husband and wife will be equal, their dependence mutual, and their obligations reciprocal. — Lucretia Mott

Weep not for me. Rather let your tears flow for the sorrows of the multitude. My work is done. Like a ripe fruit I admit the gathering. Death has no terrors for it is a wise law of nature. I am ready whenever the summons may come. — Lucretia Mott

Women's property has been taxed, equally with that of men's, to sustain colleges endowed by the states; but they have not been permitted to enter those high seminaries of learning. — Lucretia Mott

My convictions led me to adhere to the sufficiency of the light within us, resting on truth as authority, rather than 'taking authority for truth.' — Lucretia Mott

We too often bind ourselves by authorities rather than by the truth. — Lucretia Mott

The world has never yet seen a truly great and virtuous nation because in the degradation of woman the very fountains of life are poisoned at their source. — Lucretia Mott

It is time that Christians were judged more by their likeness to Christ than their notions of Christ. Were this sentiment generally admitted we should not see such tenacious adherence to what men deem the opinions and doctrines of Christ while at the same time in every day practise is exhibited anything but a likeness to Christ. — Lucretia Mott

I have no idea of submitting tamely to injustice inflicted either on me or on the slave. I will oppose it with all the moral powers with which I am endowed. I am no advocate of passivity. — Lucretia Mott

A child, like all other human beings, has inalienable rights. — Lucretia Mott

Let us no longer be blinded by the dim theology that only in the far seeing vision discovers a millennium, when violence shall no more be heard in the land wasting nor destruction in her borders; but let us behold it now, nigh at the door lending faith and confidence to our hopes, assuring us that even we ourselves shall be instrumental in proclaiming liberty to the captive. — Lucretia Mott

Woman has so long been subject to the disabilities and restrictions with which her progress has been embarrassed that she has become enervated, her mind to some extent paralyzed; and like those still more degraded by personal bondage she hugs her chains. — Lucretia Mott

Christian soldiers armed with virtue- hearts afire with blind obsession, cannot see the difference 'twixt compassion and oppression — Lucretia Mott

Learning, while at school, that the charge for the education of girls was the same as that for boys, and that, when they became teachers, women received only half as much as men for their services, the injustice of this distinction was so apparent. — Lucretia Mott

I long for the day my sisters will rise, and occupy the sphere to which they are called by their high nature and destiny. — Lucretia Mott

I resolved to claim for my sex all that an impartial Creator had bestowed, which, by custom and a perverted application of the Scriptures, had been wrested from woman. — Lucretia Mott

I want that there should be a belief, a faith in the possibility of removing mountains to the side of right. If we believe that war is wrong, as everyone must, then we ought to believe that by proper efforts on our part, it may be done away with. — Lucretia Mott

I grew up so thoroughly imbued with women's rights that it was the most important question of my life from a very early day. — Lucretia Mott

Truth for authority, not authority for truth. — Lucretia Mott

It is not Christianity, but priestcraft that has subjected woman as we find her. — Lucretia Mott