Atheism Quotes - Page 32

• Religion! O Diabole! Fie, I am asham'd, however that I seem, To think a word of such simple sound, Of such great matter should be made the ground.

  Christopher Marlowe

  Simple, Thinking, Sound

  Christopher Marlowe (1826). “The works of Christopher Marlowe”, p.294

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• The clergy complain of the enormous spread of bold books, from the infidel tract to the latest handling of the miracle question.

  Harriet Martineau

  Book, Miracle, Complaining

  Harriet Martineau (1837). “Society in America”, p.233

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• The lesson taught us by these kindly commentators on my present experience is that dogmatic faith compels the best minds and hearts to narrowness and insolence.

  Harriet Martineau

  Heart, Taught Us, Mind

  Harriet Martineau, Linda H. Peterson (2007). “Autobiography”, Broadview Pr

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• The absence of theistic belief...

  Joseph McCabe

  Belief, Absence

  "A Rationalist Encyclopaedia: A Book of Reference on Religion, Philosophy, Ethics, and Science". Book by Joseph McCabe, 1948.

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• My business in life has been to think and learn, and to speak out with absolute freedom what I have thought and learned. The freedom is itself a positive and never-failing enjoyment to me, after the bondage of my early life.

  Harriet Martineau

  Thinking, Speaks Out, Failing

  Harriet Martineau (2015). “Harriet Martineau's Autobiography (Vol. I: Abridged, Annotated)”, p.85, BIG BYTE BOOKS

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• What does democracy come down to? The persuasive power of slogans invented by wily self-seeking politicians.

  W. Somerset Maugham

  Self, Democracy, Doe

  W. Somerset Maugham (1939). “Christmas Holiday”

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• The artist can within limits make what he likes of his life... It is only the artist, and maybe the criminal, who can make his own.

  W. Somerset Maugham

  Artist, Criminals, Limits

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• To abdicate from the rule of reason and substitute for it an authentication of belief by the intentness and degree of conviction with which we hold it can be perilous and destructive. Religious beliefs give a spurious spiritual dimension to tribal enmities.

  Peter Medawar

  Spiritual, Religious, Giving

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• Evolution throws a wonderful light on all the struggles, eccentricities, tortuous developments of the human conscience in the past. It is the only theory of morals that does. And evolution throws just as much light on the ethical and social struggle today; and it is the only theory that does. What a strange age ours is from the religious point of view! What a hopeless age from the philosopher's point of view! Yet it is a very good age, the best that ever was. No evolutionist is a pessimist.

  Joseph McCabe

  Religious, Struggle, Past

  "The Human Origin of Morals". Book by Joseph McCabe, 1926.

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• The mystic sees the ineffable, and the psychopathologist the unspeakable.

  W. Somerset Maugham

  Ineffable, Mystic, Unspeakable

  The Moon and Sixpence Ch. 1

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• It is naïve to suppose that the acceptance of evolution theory depends upon the evidence of a number of so-called "proofs"; it depends rather upon the fact that the evolutionary theory permeates and supports every branch of biological science, much as the notion of the roundness of the earth underlies all geodesy and all cosmological theories on which the shape of the earth has a bearing. Thus antievolutionism is of the same stature as flat-earthism.

  Peter Medawar

  Acceptance, Numbers, Support

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• It goes with the passionate intensity and deep conviction of the truth of a religious belief, and of course of the importance of the superstitious observances that go with it, that we should want others to share it - and the only certain way to cause a religious belief to be held by everyone is to liquidate nonbelievers. The price in blood and tears that mankind generally has had to pay for the comfort and spiritual refreshment that religion has brought to a few has been too great to justify our entrusting moral accountancy to religious belief.

  Peter Medawar

  Spiritual, Religious, Blood

  Peter Brian Medawar (1996). “The Strange Case of the Spotted Mice and Other Classic Essays on Science”, p.210, Oxford University Press, USA

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• I believe that a person should take an affirmative outlook. There are always problems in life, old and new, uncertainties, and unexpected contingencies. The optimal way to deal with this is not to give up in despair, but to move ahead using the best intelligence and resources that we have to overcome adversity.

  Paul Kurtz

  Giving Up, Moving, Believe

  "Isn't Religion Weird? Quotations for Atheists". Book by Dave Lane (p. 117), August 8, 2008.

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• In contemporary society secular humanism has been singled out by critics and proponents alike as a position sharply distinguishable from any religious formulation. Religious fundamentalists in the United States have waged a campaign against secular humanism, claiming that it is a rival "religion" and seeking to root it out from American public life. Secular humanism is avowedly non-religious. It is a eupraxsophy (good practical wisdom), which draws its basic principles and ethical values from science, ethics, and philosophy.

  Paul Kurtz

  Religious, Philosophy, Roots

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• The overriding need is "to develop a new Planetary Humanism" that will seek to preserve human rights and enhance human freedom and dignity and will emphasize our commitment "to humanity as a whole." The underlying ethical principle "is the need to respect the dignity and worth of all persons in the world community." Thinkers as diverse as Peter Singer and Hans Küng also emphasize the need for a new global ethic beyond nationalistic, racial, religious, and ethnic chauvinism.

  Paul Kurtz

  Religious, Commitment, Ethical Principles

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• An ideology can be defined as a group of beliefs that individuals borrow; most people borrow an ideology by identifying with a social group ... with a body of sacred documents and heroes.

  Robert E Lane

  Hero, People, Body

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• I light candles. I meditate. And I don't believe in anything. By default I move simultaneously towards mysticism and atheism. It's not something that's ever going to get fixed.

  Vanessa Veselka

  Believe, Moving, Candle

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• Human life has no meaning independent of itself. There is no cosmic force or deity to give it meaning or significance. There is no ultimate destiny for man. Such a belief is an illusion of humankind's infancy. The meaning of life is what we choose to give it. Meaning grows out of human purposes alone. Nature provides us with an infinite range of opportunities, but it is only our vision and our action that select and realize those that we desire.

  Paul Kurtz

  Independent, Opportunity, Destiny

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• The greatest problem we face is the growing number of people living in poverty. The related sense of hopelessness has to be impacting on every part of environmental management.

  Richard Leakey

  Numbers, People, Environmental

  Interview, content.time.com. April 11, 1999.

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• Supernatural entities simply do not exist. This nonreality of the supernatural means, on the human level, that men do not possess supernatural and immortal souls; and, on the level of the universe as a whole, that our cosmos does not possess a supernatural and eternal God.

  Corliss Lamont

  Mean, Men, Soul

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• God, once imagined to be an omnipresent force throughout the whole world of nature and man. has been increasingly tending to seem omniabsent. Everywhere, intelligent and educated people rely more and more on purely secular and scientific techniques for the solution of their problems. As science advances, belief in divine miracles and the efficacy of prayer becomes fainter and fainter.

  Corliss Lamont

  Prayer, Intelligent, Men

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• Dogma is a defensive reaction against doubt in the mind of the theorist, but doubt of which he is unaware.

  Harold Lasswell

  Mind, Doubt, Dogma

  Harold D. Lasswell (1986). “Psychopathology and Politics”, p.175, University of Chicago Press

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• The essential mark of the agitator is the high value he places on the emotional response of the public. Whether he attacks or defends social institutions is a secondary matter.

  Harold Lasswell

  Emotional, Matter, Essentials

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• There is a dispute about the existence of God. Both sides try to hide that they killed Him - even before He came into being.

  Stanislaw Jerzy Lec

  Trying, Sides, Disputes

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• Do I have no soul as punishment for not believing in the soul?

  Stanislaw Jerzy Lec

  Believe, Punishment, Soul

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