Positive Atheism Quotes - Page 13

• If the hammer and the shuttle could move themselves, slavery would be unnecessary.

  Aristotle

  Moving, Atheism, Would Be

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• Religion is not a nice thing. It is potentially a very dangerous thing because it involves a heady complex of emotions, desires, yearnings and fears.

  Karen Armstrong

  Nice, Atheism, Desire

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• Intellectuals cannot tolerate the chance event, the unintelligible: they have a nostalgia for the absolute, for a universally comprehensive scheme.

  Raymond Aron

  Atheism, Events, Chance

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• One would suppose that the battle for religious liberty was won in the United States two hundred years ago. However, in the time since, and right now, powerful voices are always raised in favor of bigotry and thought control. It is useful, then, to have a compendium of the thoughts of great men and women of all faiths (and of none) on the subject, to convince us that we men and woman of freedom are not and never have been alone.

  Isaac Asimov

  Religious, Powerful, Men

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• Suppress prostitution, and capricious lusts will overthrow society.

  Saint Augustine

  Lust, Atheism, Capricious

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• If the assertion that there is a god is nonsensical, then the atheist's assertion that there is no god is equally nonsensical, since it is only a significant proposition that can be significantly contradicted.

  A.J. Ayer

  Atheist, Atheism, Nonsensical

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• I take it, therefore, to be a fact, that one's existence ends with death. I think it possible to show how this fact can be emotionally acceptable.

  A.J. Ayer

  Thinking, Atheism, Facts

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• When church and state are separate, the effects are happy, and they do not at all interfere with each other: but where they have been confounded together, no tongue nor pen can fully describe the mischiefs that have ensued.

  Isaac Backus

  Church, Together, Atheism

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• God, or rather the fiction of God, is thus the sanction and the intellectual and moral cause of all the slavery on earth, and the liberty of men will not be complete, unless it will have completely annihilated the inauspicious fiction of a heavenly master.

  Mikhail Bakunin

  Men, Intellectual, Liberty

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• Even if nothing worse than wasted mental effort could be laid to the charge of theology, that alone ought to be sufficient to banish it from the earth, as one of the worst enemies of mankind.

  Lydia M. Child

  Worst Enemy, Effort, Atheism

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• I have seen myself lose intolerance, narrowness, bigotry, complacence, pride and a whole bushel-basket of other intellectual vices through my contact with Nature and with men. And when you take weeds out of a garden it gives you room to grow flowers. So, every time I lost a little self-satisfaction, or arrogance, I could plant some broadness or love of my own in its place, and after a while the garden of my mind began to bloom and be fragrant and I found myself better equipped for my work and more useful to others as a consequence.

  Luther Burbank

  Weed, Flower, Pride

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• The uncompromising attitude is more indicative of an inner uncertainty than a deep conviction. The implacable stand is directed more against the doubt within than the assailant without.

  Eric Hoffer

  Attitude, Doubt, Conviction

  Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

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• The idea that He would take his attention away from the universe in order to give me a bicycle with three speeds is just so unlikely I can't go along with it.

  Quentin Crisp

  Order, Ideas, Giving

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• I had a student ask me, "Could the savior you believe in save Osama bin Laden?" Of course, we know the blood of Jesus Christ can save him, and then he must be executed.

  Jerry Falwell

  Religious, Jesus, Believe

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• If you want a war, nourish a doctrine. Doctrines are the most frightful tyrants to which men are ever subject, because doctrines get inside a man's reason and betray him against himself. Civilized men have done their fiercest fighting for doctrines.

  William Graham Sumner

  Betrayal, War, Fighting

  William Graham Sumner (1963). “Social Darwinism: selected essays”, Prentice Hall

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• The clergy know that I know that they know that they do not know.

  Robert Green Ingersoll

  Atheist, Clergy, Undesirable

  Robert Green Ingersoll (1907). “The works of Robert G. Ingersoll”, p.479, Library of Alexandria

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• All religions united with government are more or less inimical to liberty. All, separated from government, are compatible with liberty.

  Henry Clay

  Government, Atheism, Liberty

  Calvin Colton, Henry Clay (1857). “The Life, Correspondence, and Speeches of Henry Clay: In Six Volumes”, p.223

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• As for myself, I do not believe that such a person as Jesus Christ ever existed; but as the people are inclined to superstition, it is proper not to oppose them.

  Napoleon Bonaparte

  Jesus, Believe, People

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• Every sect is a certificate that God has not plainly revealed his will to man. To each reader the Bible conveys a different meaning.

  Robert Green Ingersoll

  Men, Different, Certificates

  Robert Green Ingersoll (1912). “Some Mistakes of Moses”, p.77, Library of Alexandria

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• Thou little thinkest what a little foolery governs the world.

  John Selden

  Atheism, World, Littles

  John Selden (1819). “Table talk: being the discourses of John Selden, esq”, p.132

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• Never king dropped out of the clouds.

  John Selden

  Kings, Clouds, Atheism

  John Selden, Samuel Weller Singer, Edward FitzGerald (1860). “Table Talk: With a Biographical Pref. and Notes”, p.219

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• What all agree upon is probably right; what no two agree in most probably is wrong.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Two, Agree Upon, Agree

  Letter to John Adams, January 11, 1817.

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• Heretical views arise when the truth is uncertain, and it is only when the truth is uncertain that censorship is invoked.

  Bertrand Russell

  Truth, Views, Speech

  Bertrand Russell (1972). “Atheism: collected essays, 1943-1949”, Arno Pr

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• Frankly, I adore your catchy slogan, "Adoption, not Abortion," although no one has been able to figure out, even with expert counseling, how to use adoption as a method of birth control, or at what time of the month it is most effective.

  Barbara Ehrenreich

  Adoption, Abortion, Atheism

  Barbara Ehrenreich (1990). “WORST YEARS OF OUR LIVES”, Pantheon

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• Science should be taught not in order to support religion and not in order to destroy religion. Science should be taught simply ignoring religion.

  Steven Weinberg

  Order, Support, Atheism

  Freethought Today (unidentified article/page), April 2000.

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