The War On Faith - HQ - Robert Ingersoll

"Give the church a place in the Constitution, let her touch once more the sword of power, and
the priceless fruit of all ages will turn to ashes on the lips of men."
.........."Individuality", 1873, in Ingersoll's Works, Vol. 1, p. 203

"Ministers say that they teach charity. That is natural. They live on alms. All beggars teach that
others should give."
.........."The Truth" 1897

"This crime called blasphemy was invented by priests for the purpose of defending doctrines
not able to take care of themselves."
.........."An Interview on Chief Justice Comegys", Brooklyn Eagle, 1881

"That church Catholic teaches us that we can make God happy by being miserable ourselves..."
.........."What Must We Do To Be Saved?" 1880, in Ingersoll's Works, Vol. 1, p. 492

"Suppose, however, that God did give this law to the Jews, and did tell them that whenever a
man preached a heresy, or proposed to worship any other God that they should kill him; and
suppose that afterward this same God took upon himself flesh, and came to this very chosen
people and taught a different religion, and that thereupon the Jews crucified him; I ask you,
did he not reap exactly what he had sown? What right would this god have to complain of a
crucifixion suffered in accordance with his own command?"
.........."Some Mistakes of Moses", in Ingersoll's Works, Vol. 2, p. 259

"Heresy is a cradle; orthodoxy a coffin."
.........."Heretics and Heresies", 1874

"In 1776 our fathers endeavored to retire the gods from politics. They declared that "all
governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed." This was a
contradiction of the then political ideas of the world; it was, as many believed, an act of pure
blasphemy a renunciation of the Deity. ...It was a notice to all churches and priests that
thereafter mankind would govern and protect themselves. Politically it tore down every altar
and denied the authority of every "sacred book" and appealed from the Providence of God to
the Providence of man."
.........."God in the Constitution", originally published in The Arena in Boston in January 1890.
Taken from The New Dresden Edition of the Works of Ingersoll New York City: The Ingersoll
Publishers, Inc., 1900

"The inspiration of the Bible depends on the credulity of him who reads."
.........."The Christian Religion" Sec. III, The IngersollBlack Debate, 1881

"Blasphemy is an epithet bestowed by superstition upon common sense."
..........Second Interview on Rev. Talmadge, 1882, in Ingersoll's Works, Vol. 5, p. 49

"God so loved the world that he made up his mind to damn a large majority of the human
race."
.........."Why I Am An Agnostic", 1876

"We cannot trample upon their rights, without endangering our own; and no man who will
take liberty from another, is great enough to enjoy liberty himself."
.......... Fifth Interview on Rev. Talmadge, 1882

"...in every religion the priest insists on five things First: There is a God. Second: He has made
known his will. Third: He has selected me to explain this message. Fourth: We will now take up
a collection; and Fifth: Those who fail to subscribe will certainly be damned."

.......... "Has Freethought a Constructive Side?", printed in The Truth Seeker, New York 1890

"Every fact is an enemy of the church. Every fact is a heretic. Every demonstration is an infidel.
Everything that ever really happened testifies against the supernatural."
.......... "Orthodoxy", 1884

"Religion supports nobody. It has to be supported. It produces no wheat, no corn; it ploughs no
land; it fells no forests. It is a perpetual mendicant. It lives on the labors of others, and then has
the arrogance to pretend that it supports the giver."
.........."A Christmas Sermon" printed in Evening Telegraph, Dec. 19, 1891

"I beg, I implore, I beseech you, never to give another dollar to build a church in which that lie
is preached. Never give another cent to send a missionary with his mouth stuffed with that
falsehood to a foreign land. Why, they say, the heathen will go to heaven, any way, if you let
them alone. What is the use of sending them to hell by enlightening them? Let them alone. The
idea of going and telling a man a thing that if he does not believe, he will be damned, when the
chances are ten to one that he will not believe it, is monstrous."
.......... "Orthodoxy", 1884

"If the book the Bible and my brain are both the work of the same Infinite God, whose fault is
it that the book and my brain do not agree?"
.........."Some Reasons Why", 1881

"Tell me there is a God in the serene heavens that will damn his children for the expression of
an honest belief! More men have died in their sins, judged by your orthodox creeds, than there
are leaves on all the forests in the wide world ten thousand times over. Tell me these men are
in hell; that these men are in torment; that these children are in eternal pain, and that they are
to be punished forever and forever! I denounce this doctrine as the most infamous of lies."
.........."The Liberty of Man, Woman and Child", 1877

"All the meanness, all the revenge, all the selfishness, all the cruelty, all the hatred, all the
infamy of which the heart of man is capable, grew, blossomed and bore fruit in this one word,
Hell."
.........."The Great Infidels", 1881

"Is it not wonderful that the creator of all worlds, infinite in power and wisdom, could not hold
his own against the gods of wood and stone? Is it not strange that after he had appeared to his
chosen people, delivered them from slavery, feed them by miracles, opened the sea for a path,
led them by cloud and fire, and overthrown their pursuers, they still preferred a calf of their
own making?" (Exod. 32:18) "...a God who gave his entire time for 40 years to the work of
converting three millions of people, and succeeded in getting only two men, and not a single
woman, decent enough to enter the promised land?" (Num. 14:2930)
.........."A Few Reasons for Doubting the Inspiration of the Bible"

"It has been contended for many years that the Ten Commandments are the foundations of all
ideas of justice and law. ...Nothing can be more stupidly false than such assertions. Thousands
of years before Moses was born, the Egyptians had a code of laws. ...far better than the
Mosaic."
.........."Some Mistakes of Moses"

"One good schoolmaster is of more use than a hundred priests."
.........."The Great Infidels", 1881 also from Speech, New York City, 1 May 1881

"In all ages hypocrites, called priests, have put crowns upon the heads of thieves, called kings."
.........."Individuality", 1873

"For many centuries the sword and cross were allies. Together they attacked the rights of man.
They defended each other."
.........."Voltaire", 1894, Sec. I

"As long as woman regards the Bible as the charter of her rights, she will be the slave of man.
The bible was not written by a woman. Within its leaves there is nothing but humiliation and
shame for her."
.........."The Liberty of Man, Woman and Child", 1877

"You have no right to erect your tollgate upon the highways of thought."
.........."The Ghosts", 1877

"The infidels of one age have been the aureoled saints of the next. The destroyers of the old are
the creators of the new."
.........."The Great Infidels", 1881

"The history of intellectual progress is written in the lives of infidels."
.........."The Great Infidels", 1881 also from Speech, New York City, 1 May 1881

"It is a blessed thing that in every age some one has had individuality enough and courage
enough to stand by his own convictions. I believe it was Magellan who said, "The church says
the earth is flat; but I have seen its shadow on the moon, and I have more confidence even in a
shadow than in the Church." On the prow of his ship were disobedience, defiance, scorn, and
success."
.........."Individuality", 1873, quoted in The Great Quotations

"How touching when the learned and wise crawl back in cribs and ask to hear the rhymes and
fables once again! How charming in these hard and scientific times to see old age in
Superstition's lap, with eager lips upon her withered breast!"
.......... "The Christian Religion" Part III, The Ingersoll Black Debate, 1881

"When a man has been "born again", all the passages of the Old Testament that appear so
horrible and so unjust to one in his natural state, become the dearest, the most consoling, and
the most beautiful of truths. The real Christian reads the accounts of these ancient battles with
the greatest possible satisfaction. To one who really loves his enemies, the groans of men, the
shrieks of women, and the cries of babes, make music sweeter than the zephyr's breath."
.......... "The Talmadgian Catechism", 1882

"Confronted with the universe, with fields of space sown thick with stars, with all there is of
life, the wise man, being asked the origin and destiny of all, replies: "I do not know. These
questions are beyond the powers of my mind." The wise man is thoughtful and modest. He
clings to facts. Beyond his intellectual horizon he does not pretend to see. He does not mistake
hope for evidence or desire for demonstration. He is honest. He neither deceives himself nor
others."
.........."Foundations of Faith", 1895

"To exempt the church from taxation, is to pay part of the priest's salary."
..........Interview in The Truth Seeker, New York, September 5, 1885. Quoted by Joseph Lewis in
"Franklin the Freethinker"

"No human being has imagination enough to conceive of this infinite horror. All that the
human race has suffered in war and want, in pestilence and famine, in fire and flood all the
pangs and pains of every disease and every death all of this is nothing compared with the
agonies to be endured by one lost soul. This is the consolation of the Christian religion. This is
the justice of God the mercy of Christ. This frightful dogma, this infinite lie, made me the
implacable enemy of Christianity. The truth is that this belief in eternal pain has been the real
persecutor. It founded the Inquisition, forged the chains, and furnished the fagots. It has
darkened the lives of many millions. It made the cradle as terrible as the coffin. It enslaved
nations and shed the blood of countless thousands. It sacrificed the wisest, the bravest and the
best. It subverted the idea of justice, drove mercy from the heart, changed men to fiends and
banished reason from the brain. Like a venomous serpent it crawls and coils and hisses in
every orthodox creed. It makes man an eternal victim and God an eternal fiend. It is the one
infinite horror. Every church in which it is taught is a public curse. Every preacher who
teaches it is an enemy of mankind. Below this Christian dogma, savagery cannot go. It is the
infinite of malice, hatred, and revenge. Nothing could add to the horror of hell, except the
presence of its creator, God. While I have life, as long as I draw breath, I shall deny with all
my strength, and hate with every drop of my blood, this infinite lie."
.........."Why I Am An Agnostic", 1896

"Christianity teaches that all offences can be forgiven. Every church unconsciously allows
people to commit crimes on credit. On the other hand, what is called infidelity says: There is
no being in the universe who rewards, and there is no being who punishes every act has its
consequences. If the act is good, the consequences are good; if the act is bad, the consequences
are bad; and these consequences must be borne by the actor. It says to every human being:
You must reap what you sow. There is no reward, there is no punishment, but there are
consequences, and these consequences are the invisible and implacable police of nature. They
cannot be avoided. They cannot be bribed. No power can awe them, and there is not gold
enough in the world to make them pause. Even a God cannot induce them to release for one
instant their victim. This great truth is, in my judgment, the gospel of morality. If all men
knew that they must inevitably bear the consequences of their own actions if they absolutely
knew that they could not injure another without injuring themselves, the world, in my
judgment, would be far better than it is."
.......... January 9, 1891, answering the critics of his "Christmas Sermon" printed in the Evening
Telegraph on December 19, 1891

"Can a good man mock at the children of deformity? Will he deride the misshapen? Your
Jehovah deformed some of his own children, and then held them up to scorn and hatred. These
divine mistakes these blunders of the infinite were not allowed to enter the temple erected in
honor of him who had dishonored them. Does a kind father mock his deformed child? What
would you think of a mother who would deride and taunt her misshapen babe?"
..........Response to Wm. E. Gladstone on his letter "Regarding Col. Ingersoll on Christianity;
Some Remarks on his Reply to Dr. Field", 1888

"I cannot see why we should expect an infinite God to do better in another world than he does
in this."
..........Reply to questions from the Indianapolis clergy, printed in "The Iconoclast", Indianapolis
Indiana 1882

"Failure seems to be the trademark of Nature. Why? Nature has no design, no intelligence.
Nature produces without purpose, sustains without intention and destroys without thought.
Man has a little intelligence, and he should use it. Intelligence is the only lever capable of
raising mankind."
.........."What Is Religion?", his last public address, delivered before the American Free Religious
association, Boston, June 2, 1899

"Our civilization is not Christian. It does not come from the skies. It is not a result of
"inspiration." It is the child of invention, of discovery, of applied knowledge that is to say, of
science. When man becomes great and grand enough to admit that all have equal rights; when
thought is untrammeled; when worship shall consist in doing useful things; when religion
means the discharge of obligations to our fellowmen, then, and not until then, will the world
be civilized."
..........Reply to questions from the Indiannapolis clergy, printed in "The Iconoclast",
Indiannapolis Indiana 1882

"When a professor in a college finds a fact, he should make it known, even if it is inconsistent
with something Moses said."
.........."Some Mistakes of Moses", 1879

"Science has nothing in common with religion. Facts and miracles never did, and never will
agree. They are not in the least related. They are deadly foes. What has religion to do with
facts? Nothing. Can there be Methodist mathematics, Catholic astronomy, Presbyterian
geology, Baptist biology, or Episcopal botany? Why, then, should a sectarian college exist?
Only that which somebody knows should be taught in our schools. We should not collect taxes
to pay people for guessing. The common school is the bread of life for the people, and it should
not be touched by the withering hand of superstition."
.........."Some Mistakes of Moses", 1879

"Why should a woman ask pardon of God for having been a mother? Why should that be
considered a crime in Exodus, which is commanded as a duty in Genesis? Why should a
mother be declared unclean? Why should giving birth to a daughter be regarded twice as
criminal as giving birth to a son? Can we believe that such laws and ceremonies were made
and instituted by a merciful and intelligent God? If there is anything in this poor world
suggestive of, and standing for, all that is sweet, loving and pure, it is a mother holding in her
thrilled and happy arms her prattling babe."
.........."Some Mistakes of Moses", 1879

"Only the other day a gentleman was telling me of a case of special providence. He knew it. He
had been the subject of it. A few years ago he was about to go on a ship when he was detained.
He did not go, and the ship was lost with all on board. "Yes!" I said, "Do you think the people
who were drowned believed in special providence?" Think of the infinite egotism of such a
doctrine. Here is a man that fails to go upon a ship with five hundred passengers and they go
down to the bottom of the sea fathers, mothers, children, and loving husbands and wives
waiting upon the shores of expectation. Here is one poor little wretch that did not happen to
go! And he thinks that God, the Infinite Being, interfered in his poor little withered behalf and
let the rest all go. That is special providence. Why does special providence allow all the
crimes? Why are the wifebeaters protected, and why are the wives and children left
defenceless if the hand of God is over us all? Who protects the insane? Why does Providence
permit insanity? But the church cannot give up special providence. If there is no such thing,
then no prayers, no worship, no churches, no priests. What would become of National
thanksgiving?"
.........."Orthodoxy", 1884

"Who can over estimate the progress of the world if all the money wasted in superstition could
be used to enlighten, elevate and civilize mankind?"
.........."Some Mistakes of Moses", 1879

"How long, O how long will mankind worship a book? How long will they grovel in the dust
before the ignorant legends of the barbaric past? How long, O how long will they pursue
phantoms in a darkness deeper than death?"
.........."Heretics and Heresies", 1874

"I would not for my life destroy one star of human hope, but I want it so that when a poor
woman rocks the cradle and sings a lullaby to the dimpled darling, she will not be compelled
to believe that ninetynine chances in a hundred she is raising kindling wood for hell."
.........."What Must We Do To Be Saved", 1880

"We did not get our freedom from the church. The great truth, that all men are by nature free,
was never told on Sinai's barren crags, nor by the lonely shores of Galilee."
.........."The Christian Religion" Part III, The Ingersoll Black Debate, 1881

"Rome was far better when Pagan than when Catholic. It was better to allow gladiators and
criminals to fight than to burn honest men. The greatest of the Romans denounced the
cruelties of the arena. Seneca condemned the combats even of wild beasts. He was tender
enough to say that "we should have a bond of sympathy for all sentient beings, knowing that
only the depraved and base take pleasure in the sight of blood and suffering." Aurelius
compelled the gladiators to fight with blunted swords. Roman lawyers declared that all men
are by nature free and equal. Woman, under Pagan rule in Rome, became as free as man. Zeno,
long before the birth of Christ, taught that virtue alone establishes a difference between men.
We know that the Civil Law is the foundation of our codes. We know that fragments of Greek
and Roman art a few manuscripts saved from Christian destruction, some inventions and
discoveries of the Moors were the seeds of modern civilization. Christianity, for a thousand
years, taught memory to forget and reason to believe. Not one step was taken in advance. Over
the manuscripts of philosophers and poets, priests with their ignorant tongues thrust out,
devoutly scrawled the forgeries of faith. For a thousand years the torch of progress was
extinguished in the blood of Christ, and his disciples, moved by ignorant zeal, by insane, cruel
creeds, destroyed with flame and sword a hundred million of their fellowmen. They made this
world a hell. But if cathedrals had been universities if dungeons of the Inquisition had been
laboratories if Christians had believed in character instead of creed if they had taken from the
Bible all the good and thrown away the wicked and absurd if domes of temples had been
observatories if priests had been philosophers if missionaries had taught the useful arts if
astrology had been astronomy if the black art had been chemistry if superstition had been
science if religion had been humanity it would have been a heaven filled with love, with liberty
and joy."
.........."The Christian Religion" Part III, The Ingersoll Black Debate, 1881

"Science is the enemy of fear and credulity. It invites investigation, challenges the reason,
stimulates inquiry, and welcomes the unbeliever. It seeks to give food and shelter, and raiment,
education and liberty to the human race. It welcomes every fact and every truth. It has
furnished a foundation of morals, a philosophy for the guidance of man. From all books it
selects the good, and from all theories, the true. It seeks to civilize the human race by the
cultivation of the intellect and heart. It refines, through art, music and the drama giving voice
and expression to every noble thought. The mysterious does not excite the feeling of worship,
but the ambition to understand. It does not pray it works. It does not answer inquiry with the
malicious cry of "blasphemy." Its feelings are not hurt by contradiction, neither does it ask to
be protected by law from the laughter of heretics. It has taught man that he cannot walk
beyond the horizon that the questions of origin and destiny cannot be answered they an
infinite personality cannot be comprehended by a finite being, and that the truth of any system
of religion based on the supernatural cannot by any possibility be established such a religion
not being within the domain of evidence. And, above all, it teaches that all our duties are here
that all our obligations are to sentient beings; that intelligence, guided by kindness, is the
highest possible wisdom; and that "man believes not what he would, but what he can."
..........Response to Wm. E. Gladstone on his letter "Regarding Col. Ingersoll on Christianity;
Some Remarks on his Reply to Dr. Field", 1888

"Who can estimate the misery that has been caused by this most infamous doctrine of eternal
punishment? Think of the lives it has blighted of the tears it has caused of the agony it has
produced. Think of the millions who have been driven to insanity by this most terrible of
dogmas. This doctrine renders God the basest and most cruel being in the universe. Compared
with him, the most frightful deities of the most barbarous and degraded tribes are miracles of
goodness and mercy. There is nothing more degrading than to worship such a god. Lower
than this the soul can never sink. If the doctrine of eternal damnation is true, let me share the
fate of the unconverted; let me have my portion in hell, rather than in heaven with a god
infamous enough to inflict eternal misery upon any of the sons of men."
.........."Heretics and Heresies", 1874

"Religion makes enemies instead of friends. That one word, "religion," covers all the horizon of
memory with visions of war, of outrage, of persecution, of tyranny, and death. That one word
brings to the mind every instrument with which man has tortured man. In that one word are
all the fagots and flames and dungeons of the past, and in that word is the infinite and eternal
hell of the future."
.........."Some Reasons Why", 1881

"No Devil, no hell. No hell, no atonement. No atonement, no preaching, no gospel."
.........."Orthodoxy", 1884

"I beg of you not to pollute the soul of childhood, not to furrow the cheeks of mothers, by
preaching a creed that should be shrieked in a madhouse. Do not make the cradle as terrible
as the coffin. Preach, I pray you, the gospel of Intellectual Hospitality the liberty of thought
and speech. Take from loving hearts the awful fear. Have mercy on your fellowmen. Do not
drive to madness the mothers whose tears are falling on the pallid faces of those who died in
unbelief. Pity the erring, wayward, suffering, weeping world. Do not proclaim as "tidings of
great joy" that an Infinite Spider is weaving webs to catch the souls of men."
..........FieldIngersoll Debate, "A Reply to the Rev. Henry M. Field, D.D., 1887

"The religion of Jesus Christ, as preached by his church, causes war, bloodshed, hatred, and all
uncharitableness; and why? Because, they say, a certain belief is necessary to salvation. They
do not say, if you behave yourself you will get there; they do not say, if you pay your debts and
love your wife and love your children, and are good to your friends, and your neighbors, and
your country, you will get there; that will do you no good; you have got to believe a certain
thing. No matter how bad you are, you can instantly be forgiven; and no matter how good you
are, if you fail to believe that which you cannot understand, the moment you get to the day of
judgment nothing is left but to damn you, and all the angels will shout "hallelujah."
.........."Orthodoxy", 1884

Over the wild waves of battle rose and fell the banner of Jesus Christ. For sixteen hundred
years the robes of the church were red with innocent blood. The ingenuity of Christians was
exhausted in devising punishment severe enough to be inflicted upon other Christians who
honestly and sincerely differed with them upon any point whatever."
.........."Heretics and Heresies", 1874

"Labor is the only prayer that Nature answers."
.........."Address to the Jury", trial of C.B. Reynolds for Blasphemy

"To me, the most obscene word in our language is celibacy."
.........."Liberty in Literature", 1890

"Celibacy is the essence of vulgarity."
.........."Rome or Reason?", Reply to Cardinal Manning, 1888

"Twenty years after the death of Luther there were more Catholics than when he was born.
And twenty years after the death of Voltaire there were millions less than when he was born."
..........Interview with New York correspondent, Chicago Times, May 29, 1881, answering
criticism by NY ministers in response to his "Great Infidels" lecture

"This century will be called Darwin's century. He was one of the greatest men who ever
touched this globe. He has explained more of the phenomena of life than all of the religious
teachers. Write the name of Charles Darwin on the one hand and the name of every theologian
who ever lived on the other, and from that name has come more light to the world than from
all of those. His doctrine of evolution, his doctrine of the survival of the fittest, his doctrine of
the origin of species, has removed in every thinking mind the last vestige of orthodox
Christianity. He has not only stated, but he has demonstrated, that the inspired writer knew
nothing of this world, nothing of the origin of man, nothing of geology, nothing of astronomy,
nothing of nature; that the Bible is a book written by ignorance at the instigation of fear.
Think of the men who replied to him. Only a few years ago there was no person too ignorant
to successfully answer Charles Darwin; and the more ignorant he was the more cheerfully he
undertook the task. He was held up to the ridicule, the scorn and contempt of the Christian
world, and yet when he died, England was proud to put his dust with that of her noblest and
her grandest. Charles Darwin conquered the intellectual world, and his doctrines are now
accepted facts."
.........."Orthodoxy", 1884

"When I became convinced that the Universe is natural that all the ghosts and gods are myths,
there entered into my brain, into my soul, into every drop of my blood, the sense, the feeling,
the joy of freedom ... For the first time, I was free ... I stood erect and joyously faced all worlds.
And then my heart was filled with gratitude, with thankfulness, and went out in love to all the
heroes, the thinkers who gave their lives for the liberty of hand and brain ... And then I vowed
to grasp the torch that they had held, and hold it high, that light might conquer darkness still.
.........."Why I Am An Agnostic", 1896, quoted in Joseph Lewis' speech "Ingersoll the
Magnificent"

"The man who does not do his own thinking is a slave, and is a traitor to himself and to his
fellowmen."
.........."The Liberty of Man, Woman and Child" 1877

"For my part I would not kill my wife, even if commanded to do so by the real God of this
universe."
.........."Some Mistakes of Moses", 1879

"I would have all the professors in colleges, all the teachers in schools of every kind, including
those in Sunday schools, agree that they would teach only what they know, that they would
not palm off guesses as demonstrated truths.
..........Speech at Chicago Exposition Building, October 20, 1876

"If there is a God, it is reasonably certain that he made the world, but it is by no means certain
that he is the author of the Bible. Why then should we not place greater confidence in Nature
than in a book? And even if this God made not only the world but the book besides, it does not
follow that the book is the best part of creation, and the only part that we will be eternally
punished for denying. It seems to me that it is quite as important to know something of the
solar system, something of the physical history of this globe, as it is to know the adventures of
Jonah or the diet of Ezekiel. For my part, I would infinitely prefer to know all the results of
scientific investigation, than to be inspired as Moses was. Supposing the Bible to be true; why
is it any worse or more wicked for Freethinkers to deny it, than for priests to deny the doctrine
of evolution, or the dynamic theory of heat? Why should we be damned for laughing at
Samson and his foxes, while others, holding the Nebular Hypothesis in utter contempt, go
straight to heaven? It seems to me that a belief in the great truths of science are fully as
essential to salvation, as the creed of any church. We are taught that a man may be perfectly
acceptable to God even if he denies the rotundity of the earth, the Copernican system, the
three laws of Kepler, the indestructibility of matter and the attraction of gravitation. And we
are also taught that a man may be right upon all these questions, and yet, for failing to believe
in the "scheme of salvation," be eternally lost."
.........."Some Mistakes of Moses", 1879

"I want no heaven for which I must give my reason; no happiness in exchange for my liberty,
and no immortality that demands the surrender of my individuality. Better rot in the
windowless tomb, to which there is no door but the red mouth of the pallid worm, than wear
the jeweled collar of a god."
.........."Individuality", 1873

"Science built the Academy, superstition the inquisition."

"I have always noticed that the people who have the smallest souls make the most fuss about
getting them saved."

"To succeed the theologan invades the cradle. In the minds of innocents they plant the seeds of
superstition. Save children from the pollution of this horror."

"Go around the world, and where you find the least superstition, there you will find the best
men, the best women, the best children."

"Public prayer is, if nothing else, an undignified public performance."
..........quoted in "Ingersoll the Magnificent" by Joseph Lewis

"Christianity has such a contemptible opinion of human nature that it does not believe a man
can tell the truth unless frightened by a belief in God. No lower opinion of the human race has
ever been expressed."

"A few years ago the Deists denied the inspiration of the Bible on account of its cruelty. At the
same time they worshiped what they were pleased to call the God of Nature. Now we are
convinced that Nature is as cruel as the Bible; so that, if the God of Nature did not write the
Bible, this God at least has caused earthquakes and pestilence and famine, and this God has
allowed millions of his children to destroy one another. So that now we have arrived at the
question not as to whether the Bible is inspired and not as to whether Jehovah is the real God,
but whether there is a God or not."

"In the presence of death I affirm and reaffirm the truth of all that I have said against the
superstitions of the world. I would say that much on the subject with my last breath."

"We have already compared the benefits of theology and science. When the theologian
governed the world, it was covered with huts and hovels for the many, palaces and cathedrals
for the few. To nearly all the children of men, reading and writing were unknown arts. The
poor were clad in rags and skins they devoured crusts, and gnawed bones. The day of Science
dawned, and the luxuries of a century ago are the necessities of today. Men in the middle
ranks of life have more of the conveniences and elegancies than the princes and kings of the
theological times. But above and over all this, is the development of mind. There is more of
value in the brain of an average man of today of a mastermechanic, of a chemist, of a
naturalist, of an inventor, than there was in the brain of the world four hundred years ago.
These blessings did not fall from the skies. These benefits did not drop from the outstretched
hands of priests. They were not found in cathedrals or behind altars neither were they
searched for with holy candles. They were not discovered by the closed eyes of prayer, nor did
they come in answer to superstitious supplication. They are the children of freedom, the gifts
of reason, observation and experience and for them all, man is indebted to man."
"Our ignorance is God; what we know is science."
.........."The Gods", 1872

"I will not attack your doctrines nor your creeds if they accord liberty to me. If they hold
thought to be dangerous if they aver that doubt is a crime, then I attack them one and all,
because they enslave the minds of men."
.........."The Ghosts", 1877

"I believe in the religion of reason the gospel of this world; in the development of the mind, in
the accumulation of intellectual wealth, to the end that man may free himself from
superstitious fear, to the end that he may take advantage of the forces of nature to feed and
clothe the world."
.........."Why Am I An Agnostic?", 1896

"To love justice, to long for the right, to love mercy, to pity the suffering, to assist weak, to
forget wrongs and remember benefits. to love the truth, to be sincere, to utter honest words, to
love liberty, to wage relentless war against slavery in all its forms, to love wife and child and
friend, to make a happy home, to love the beautiful in art, in nature, to cultivate the mind, to
be familiar with the mighty thoughts that genius has expressed, the noble deeds of all the
world, to cultivate courage and cheerfulness, to make others happy, to fill life with the
splendor of generous acts, the warmth of loving words, to discard error, to destroy prejudice,
to receive new truths with gladness, to cultivate hope, to see the calm beyond the storm, the
dawn beyond the night, to do the best that can be done and then to be resigned this is the
religion of reason, the creed of science. This satisfies the brain and heart."
.........."The Foundations of Faith", 1895, Section VIII, "Conclusion"

"When I became convinced that the Universe is natural that all the ghosts and gods are myths,
there entered into my brain, into my soul, into every drop of my blood, the sense, the feeling,
the joy of freedom. The walls of my prison crumbled and fell, the dungeon was flooded with
light and all the bolts, and bars, and manacles became dust. I was no longer a servant, a serf,
or a slave. There was for me no master in all the wide worldnot even in infinite space. I was
free.
free to think, to express my thoughts
free to live to my own ideal
free to live for myself and those I loved
free to use all my faculties, all my senses
free to spread imagination's wings
free to investigate, to guess and dream and hope
free to judge and determine for myself
free to reject all ignorant and cruel creeds, all the "inspired" books that savages have
produced, and all the barbarous legends of the past
free from popes and priests
free from all the "called" and "set apart"
free from sanctified mistakes and holy lies
free from the fear of eternal pain
free from the winged monsters of night
free from devils, ghosts, and gods
For the first time I was free. There were no prohibited places in all the realms of my thought,
no air, no space, where fancy could not spread her painted wings
no chains for my limbs
no lashes for my back
no fires for my flesh
no master's frown or threat
no following another's steps
no need to bow, or cringe, or crawl, or utter lying words.
I was free. I stood erect and fearlessly, joyously, faced all worlds. And then my heart was filled
with gratitude, with thankfulness, and went out in love to all the heroes, the thinkers who gave
their lives for the liberty of hand and brain
for the freedom of labor and thought
to those who fell on the fierce fields of war, to those who died in dungeons bound with chains
to those who proudly mounted scaffold's stairs
to those whose bones were crushed, whose flesh was scarred and torn
to those by fire consumed
to all the wise, the good, the brave of every land, whose thoughts and deeds have given
freedom to the sons of men.
And I vowed to grasp the torch that they had held, and hold it high, that light might conquer
darkness still."
(18331899), "Why Am I An Agnostic?", 1896

"The first great step towards progress, is, for man to cease to be the slave of man; the second,
to cease to be the slave of the monsters of his own creation."
.........."The Ghosts", 1877

No man with any sense of humor ever founded a religion."
.........."What Must We Do To Be Saved", 1880

"The clergy know that I know that they know that they do not know."
.........."Orthodoxy", 1884

"Belief is not a voluntary thing. A man believes or disbelieves in spite of himself. They tell us
that to believe is the safe way; but I say, the safe way is to be honest."
.........."Some Reasons Why I Am a Freethinker", 1881

"The church never doubts never inquires. To doubt is heresy. To inquire is to admit that you do
not know and the church does neither."
.........."Thomas Paine", 1870

"A miracle is the badge and brand of fraud. ... No intelligent, honest man ever pretended to
perform a miracle, and never will."
.........."About the Holy Bible", 1894

"Commerce makes friends, religion makes enemies; the one enriches, and the other
impoverishes; the one thrives best where the truth is told, the other where falsehoods are
believed."

"Intelligence is the only moral guide."
.........."What Would You Substitute For the Bible as a Moral Guide?"

"Ignorance is the soil of the supernatural. The foundation of Christianity has crumbled, has
disappeared, and the entire fabric must fall. The natural is true. The miraculous is false."

"We have at last ascertained that miracles can be perfectly understood; that there is nothing
mysterious about them; that they are simply transparent falsehoods."

"All the professors in all the religious colleges in this country rolled into one, would not equal
Charles Darwin."

"The destroyer of weeds, thistles and thorns is a benefactor whether he soweth grain or not."

"I have noticed all my life that many people think they have religion when they are troubled
with dyspepsia."

"Should it turn out that I am the worst man in the whole world, the story of the flood will
remain just as improbable as before, and the contradictions of the Pentateuch will still demand
an explanation."

"To know that the Bible is the literature of a barbarous people, to know that it is uninspired, to
be certain that the supernatural does not and cannot exist all this is but the beginning of
wisdom."

"Mental slavery is mental death and every man who has given up his intellectual freedom is
the living coffin of his dead soul."

"Christians tell me that they love their enemies, and yet all I ask is not that they love their
enemies, not that they love their friends even, but that they treat those who differ from them,
with simple fairness. We do not wish to be forgiven, but we wish Christians to so act that we
will not have to forgive them."

"There are others who take the ground that all is natural; that there never has been, never will
be, never can be any interference from without, for the reason that nature embraces all, and
that there can be no without or beyond."

"I admit that reason is a small and feeble flame, a flickering torch by stumblers carried in the
starless night, blown and flared by passion's storm, and yet, it is the only light. Extinguish that,
and nought remains."

"Beyond the truths that have been demonstrated is the horizon of the Probable, and in the
world of the Probable every man has the right to guess for himself. Beyond the region of the
Probable is the Possible, and beyond the Possible is the Impossible, and beyond the Impossible
are the religions of this world. My idea is this: Any man who acts in view of the Improbable or
of the Impossible that is to say, of the Supernatural is a superstitious man. Any man who
believes that he can add to the happiness of the Infinite, by depriving himself of innocent
pleasure, is superstitious. Any man who imagines that he can make some God happy, by
making himself miserable, is superstitious. Any one who thinks he can gain happiness in
another world, by raising hell with his fellowmen in this, is simply superstitious. Any man who
believes in a Being of infinite wisdom and goodness, and yet believes that that being has
peopled a world with failures, is superstitious. Any man who believes that an infinitely wise
and good God would take pains to make a man, intending at the time that the man should be
eternally damned, is absurdly superstitious. In other words, he who believes that there is, or
that there can be, any other religious duty than to increase the happiness of mankind, in this
world, now and here, is superstitious."

"Ignorance is the soil in which belief in miracles grows."

"The mechanic, when a wheel refuses to turn, never thinks of dropping on his knees and
asking the assistance of some divine power. He knows there is a reason. He knows that
something is too large or too small; that there is something wrong with his machine; and he
goes to work and he makes it larger or smaller, here or there, until the wheel will turn."

"I have no confidence in any religion that can be demonstrated only to children."