Authors:
  • The only idea man can affix to the name of God, is that of a first cause, the cause of all things. And, incomprehensibly difficult as it is for a man to conceive what a first cause is, he arrives at the belief of it, from the tenfold greater difficulty of disbelieving it. It is difficult beyond description to conceive that space can have no end; but it is more difficult to conceive an end. It is difficult beyond the power of man to conceive an eternal duration of what we call time; but it is more impossible to conceive a time when there shall be no time.

    Thomas Paine (1794). “Paine's Age of Reason, with Remarks, Containing a Vindication of the Doctrines of Christianity from the Aspersions of that Author. By a Citizen of the World [i.e. James Tytler]”, p.73
Cite this Page: Citation