You can kill a man but you can't kill an idea.

You can kill a man but you can't kill an idea.

To speak of God, to think of God, is in every respect to show what one is made of. I read more

To speak of God, to think of God, is in every respect to show what one is made of. I have always wagered against God and I regard the little that I have won in this world as simply the outcome of this bet. However paltry may have been the stake (my life) I am conscious of having won to the full. Everything that is doddering, squint-eyed, vile, polluted and grotesque is summoned up for me in that one word: God!

The people who have really made history are the martyrs.

The people who have really made history are the martyrs.

Every man, either to his terror or consolation, has some sense of religion.

Every man, either to his terror or consolation, has some sense of religion.

If you talk to God, you are praying; if God talks to you, you have schizophrenia.

If you talk to God, you are praying; if God talks to you, you have schizophrenia.

The foundation of all morality is to have done, once and for all, with lying; to give up pretending to read more

The foundation of all morality is to have done, once and for all, with lying; to give up pretending to believe that for which there is no evidence, and repeating unintelligible propositions about things beyond the possibilities of knowledge.

The human understanding is no dry light, but receives infusion from the will and affections; which proceed sciences which may read more

The human understanding is no dry light, but receives infusion from the will and affections; which proceed sciences which may be called "sciences as one would." For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes. Therefore he rejects difficult things from impatience of research; sober things, because they narrow hope; the deeper things of nature, from superstition; the light of experience, from arrogance and pride; things not commonly believed, out of deference to the opinion of the vulgar. Numberless in short are the ways, and sometimes imperceptible, in which the affections color and infect the understanding.

When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said "Let us pray." read more

When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said "Let us pray." We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land.

I feel no need for any other faith than my faith in the kindness of human beings. I am so read more

I feel no need for any other faith than my faith in the kindness of human beings. I am so absorbed in the wonder of earth and the life upon it that I cannot think of heaven and angels.