250 quotes
The disciples of fear cannot touch me.
My Reviewers Reviewed (1877)
Intelligence is the only moral guide.
What Would You Substitute for the Bible as a Moral Guide? (1900)
If we wish to be true to ourselves, — if we wish to benefit our fellow-men — if we wish to live honorable lives — we will give to every other human being every right that we claim for ourselves.
The trial of Charles B. Reynolds for blasphemy (1887)
This is all he says about the most wonderful vision that ever astonished human eyes, a miracle great enough to have stuffed credulity to bursting; and yet all we have is this one, poor, meagre verse.
Orthodoxy (1884)
Nothing discloses real character like the use of power. It is easy for the weak to be gentle. Most people can bear adversity. But if you wish to know what a man really is, give him power. This is the supreme test.
They say the religion of your fathers is good enough. Why should a father object to your inventing a better plow than he had? They say to me, do you know more than all the theologians dead? Being a perfectly modest man I say I think I do.
A fact never went into partnership with a miracle. Truth does not need the assistance of miracle. A fact will fit every other fact in the Universe, because it is the product of all other facts. A lie will fit nothing except another lie made for the express purpose of fitting it.
Nothing could tempt me to do this man injustice, though I could hardly add to the injury he has done himself.
Dr. Buckley, who, as I understand it, is a doctor of theology—and I should think such theology stood in need of a doctor…
A Christmas Sermon (1890)
It is only when we discard the idea of a deity, the idea of cruelty or goodness in nature, that we are able ever to bear with patience the ills of life.
The clergy have always had great faith in famine, in affliction, in pestilence. They know that a man is a thousand times more apt to thank God for a crust or a crumb than for a banquet.
Why should a Christian hesitate to kill a man that his God is waiting to damn? Why should a Christian pity an unbeliever—one who has rejected the Bible—when he knows that God will be pitiless forever?
Orthodoxy (1884)
This chronology is infinitely absurd, and I do not believe that there is an intelligent, well-educated Christian in the world, having examined the subject, who will say that the Christian chronology is correct.
A Christmas Sermon (1890)
Were we allowed to read the Bible as we do all other books, we would admire its beauties, treasure its worthy thoughts, and account for all its absurd, grotesque and cruel things, by saying that its authors lived in rude, barbaric times.
Some Mistakes of Moses (1879)
If you send men to the penitentiary for speaking their thoughts, for endeavoring to enlighten their fellows, then the penitentiary will become a place of honor, and the victim will step from it — not stained, not disgraced, but clad in robes of glory.
The trial of Charles B. Reynolds for blasphemy (1887)
The intelligent men of the world do not believe in orthodox Christianity. It is today a symptom of intellectual decay. The conservative ministers are the stupid ones.
He had never heard of the lame, the halt, and the blind that had been cured; or if he had, he did not think these incidents of enough importance to be embalmed in an epistle.
To the Indianapolis Clergy." The Iconoclast (Indianapolis, IN) (1883)
I can say, if I wish, extremely mean and hateful things. I have read a great many religious papers and discussions and think that I now know all the infamous words in our language.
My Reviewers Reviewed (1877)
"Oh," but they say to me, "you take away immortality." I do not. If we are immortal it is a fact in nature, and we are not indebted to priests for it, nor to bibles for it, and it cannot be destroyed by unbelief.
What Must We Do To Be Saved? (1880)
The people became convinced—being ignorant, stupid and credulous—that the church held the keys of heaven and hell. The foundation for the most terrible mental tyranny that has existed among men was in this way laid.
Rome, or Reason? A Reply to Cardinal Manning. Part I. The North American Review (1888)