35 Quotes About Submission to Authority

We all must follow some set of rules or laws in life. Understanding when that line is about to be crossed will prevent you from getting in trouble with authority. These quotes about submission to authority demonstrate the willingness we must have to all be functional and law abiding citizens in any nation.

“A man is not far from the gates of heaven when he is fully submissive to the Lord’s will.”

“A substantial proportion of people do what they are told to do, irrespective of the content of the act, and without pangs of conscience, so long as they perceive that the command comes from a legitimate authority.”

“And perhaps our awareness is the first step to our liberation.”

“But the culture has failed, almost entirely, in inculcating internal controls on actions that have their origin in authority. For this reason, the latter constitutes a far greater danger to human survival.”

“Character is in turn the enduring source of virtue. It stands by itself and excites admiration in others. It is not obedience to authority, and while it is often consistent with and reinforced by religious belief, it is not piety.”

“Each individual possesses a conscience which to a greater or lesser degree serves to restrain the unimpeded flow of impulses destructive to others.”

“If you are a czar or a king or a president or someone that wants to control those below them you do not want people to have a consciousness of life, of their needs.”

“Indignation is a submission of our thoughts, but not of our desires.”

“It is not so much the kind of person a man is as the kind of situation in which he finds himself that determines how he will act.”

“It may be that we are puppets-puppets controlled by the strings of society. But at least we are puppets with perception, with awareness. And perhaps our awareness is the first step to our liberation.”

“It’s hard for an educated woman to turn her head off. That’s part of the joy of being a submissive. None of the decisions are yours.”

“Keep me rather in this cage, and feed me sparingly, if you dare. Anything that brings me closer to illness and the edge of death makes me more faithful.”

“Love is giving up control. It’s surrendering the desire to control the other person. The two—love and controlling power over the other person—are mutually exclusive.”

“Obedience is an act of faith; disobedience is the result of unbelief.”

“Obedience to authority saves many skins.”

“Obedience to lawful authority is the foundation of manly character.”

“Once vigorous measures appear to be the only means left of bringing the Americans to a due submission to the mother country, the colonies will submit.”

“One should respect public opinion insofar as is necessary to avoid starvation and keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny.”

“Oppression that is clearly inexorable and invincible does not give rise to revolt but to submission.”

“Ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process.”

“Part of the reason that the government’s fear mongering is succeeding is because so many people are so ignorant, that it is easier for government to frighten people in submission.”

“Punishment may make us obey the orders we are given, but at best it will only teach an obedience to authority, not a self-control which enhances our self-respect.”

“Relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority.”

“Resentment is often a woman’s inner signal that she has been ignoring an important God-given responsibility – that of making choices.”

“Submission is not about authority and it is not obedience; it is all about relationships of love and respect.”

“The cost of freedom is always high, but Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender, or submission.”

“The disappearance of a sense of responsibility is the most far-reaching consequence of submission to authority.”

“The essence in obedience consists in the fact that a person comes to view himself as an instrument for carrying out another person’s wishes and he therefore no longer regards himself as responsible for his actions.”

“The modern susceptibility to conformity and obedience to authority indicates that the truth endorsed by authority is likely to be accepted as such by a majority of people, who are innately obedient to authority.”

“The path we have chosen for the present is full of hazards, as all paths are. The cost of freedom is always high, but Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender, or submission.”

“The reason why many are still troubled, still seeking, still making little forward progress is because they haven’t yet come to the end of themselves.”

“The success of the suffrage movement would injure women spiritually and intellectually, for they would be assuming a burden though they knew themselves unable to bear it. It is the sediment, not the wave, of a sex. It is the antithesis of that highest and sweetest mystery conviction by submission, and conquest by sacrifice.”

“There are some who want to get married and others who don’t. I have never had an impulse to go to the altar. I am a difficult person to lead.”

“True strength lies in submission which permits one to dedicate his life, through devotion, to something beyond himself.”

“You cannot fulfill God’s purposes for your life while focusing on your own plans.”

Being obedient means that we must follow a set of given rules and submit to the authority of others designated in charge.