Robert green ingersoll quotes

This, in my judgment, is the highest philosophy: First, do not regret having lost yesterday; second, do not fear that you will lose tomorrow; third, enjoy today.

The savage prays to a stone that he calls a god, while the Christian prays to a god he calls a spirit, and the prayers of both are equally useful.

Creationists use facts the same way a drunk uses a lightpost: for support instead of illumination

Instead of loving a God, we love each other. Instead of the religion of the sky-the religion of this world-the religion of the family-the love of husband for wife, of wife for husband-the love of all for children. So that now the real religion is: Let us live for each other; let us live for this world without regard for the past and without fear for the future. Let us use our faculties and our powers for the benefit of ourselves and others, knowing that if there be another world, the same philosophy that gives us joy here will make us happy there.

For myself, I have but little confidence in any business, or enterprise, or investment, that promises dividends only after the death of the stockholders.

Nothing could be more idiotic and absurd than the doctrine of the trinity.

The intellectual advancement of man depends on how often he can exchange an old superstition for a new truth.

The church teaches us that we can make God happy by being miserable ourselves.

There will never be a generation of great men until there has been a generation of free women - of free mothers.

Reason, observation, and experience; the holy trinity of science.

Every man is dishonest who lives upon the labor of others, no matter if he occupies a throne.

The man who does not do his own thinking is a slave, and is a traitor to himself and to his fellow-men.

The greatest test of courage on earth is to bear defeat without losing heart.

The few have said, Think! The many have said, Believe! The first doubt was the womb and cradle of progress, and from the first doubt, man has continued to advance.

Man must learn to rely upon himself. Reading bibles will not protect him from the blasts of winter, but houses, fires. and clothing will. To prevent famine, one plow is worth a million sermons, and even patent medicines will cure more diseases than all the prayers uttered since the beginning of the world.

If God created the universe, there was a time when he commenced to create. Back of that commencement there must have been an eternity. In that eternity what was this God doing? He certainly did not think. There was nothing to think about. He did not remember. Nothing had ever happened. What did he do? Can you imagine anything more absurd than an infinite intelligence in infinite nothing wasting an eternity?

Who can estimate the misery that has been caused by this 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 renters God the basest and most cruel being in the universe. ... There is nothing more degrading than to worship such a god.

Give to every human being every right that you claim for yourself.

All that is necessary, as it seems to me, to convince any reasonable person that the Bible is simply and purely of human invention - of barbarian invention - is to read it. Read it as you would any other book; think of it as you would of any other; get the bandage of reverence from your eyes; drive from your heart the phantom of fear; push from the throne of your brain the cowled form of superstition - then read the Holy Bible, and you will be amazed that you ever, for one moment, supposed a being of infinite wisdom, goodness and purity, to be the author of such ignorance and of such atrocity.

Labor is the only prayer that Nature answers.

Superstition is, always has been, and forever will be, the foe of progress, the enemy of education and the assassin of freedom.

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.

Arguments cannot be answered with insults. . . . Kindness is strength. . . . Anger blows out the lamp of the mind. In the examination of a great and important question, every one should be serene, slow-pulsed, and calm.

It is contended by many that ours is a Christian government, founded upon the Bible, and that all who look upon the book as false or foolish are destroying the foundation of our country. The truth is, our government is not founded upon the rights of gods, but upon the rights of men. Our Constitution was framed, not to declare and uphold the deity of Christ, but the sacredness of humanity. Ours is the first government made by the people and for the people. It is the only nation with which the gods have had nothing to do.

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?

Is there an intelligent man or woman now in the world who believes in the Garden of Eden story? If you find any man who believes it, strike his forehead and you will hear an echo. Something is for rent.

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

On every hand there seems to be design to defeat design. If God created man - if he is the father of us all, why did he make the criminals, the insane, the deformed and idiotic? Should the mother, who clasps to her breast an idiot child, thank God?

You cannot be so poor that you cannot help somebody.

Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so.

...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.

According to the celestial multiplication table, once one is three, and three times one is one, and according to heavenly subtraction if we take two from three, three are left. The addition is equally peculiar, if we add two to one we have but one. Each one is equal to himself and the other two.

A believer is a bird in a cage, a freethinker is an eagle parting the clouds with tireless wing.

No man with a sense of humor ever founded a religion.

All I have to say is, Love one another - that is the height of all philosophy. It is beyond all religions. It is the secret of joy - the fountain of Perpetual Youth - the only rainbow on life's dark cloud.

They say: Belief is important. I say: No, actions are important. Judge by deed, not by creed.

Most men are followers, and implicitly rely upon the judgment of others. They mistake solemnity for wisdom, and regard a grave countenance as the title page and Preface to a most learned volume. So they are easily imposed upon by forms, strange garments, and solemn ceremonies. And when the teaching of parents, the customs of neighbors, and the general tongue approve and justify a belief or creed, no matter how absurd, it is hard even for the strongest to hold the citadel of his soul. In each country, in defence of each religion, the same arguments would be urged.

It is hard for many people to give up the religion in which they were born; to admit that their fathers were utterly mistaken, and that the sacred records of their country are but collections of myths and fables.

A fact never went into partnership with a miracle. Truth scorns the assistance of wonders. A fact will fit every other fact in the universe, and that is how you can tell whether it is or is not a fact. A lie will not fit anything except another lie.

Blasphemy is what an old dogma screams at a new truth.

To be like other people is to be unlike ourselves.

The idea of immortality, that like a sea has ebbed and flowed in the human heart, with its countless waves of hope and fear, beating against the shores and rocks of time and fate, was not born of any book, nor of any creed, nor of any religion. It was born of human affection, and it will continue to ebb and flow beneath the mists and clouds of doubt and darkness as long as love kisses the lips of death. It is the rainbow -- Hope shining upon the tears of grief.

In a world of cruelty, sympathy is a crime, and in a world of lies, truth is blasphemy.

He loves his country best who strives to make it best.

The few took advantage of the ignorant many. They pretended to have received messages from the Unknown. They stood between the helpless multitude and the gods. They were the carriers of flags of truce. At the court of heaven they presented the cause of man, and upon the labor of the deceived they lived.

Labor is the only prayer that Nature answers: It is the only prayer that deserves an answer—good, honest, noble work.

The superior man is the providence of the inferior. He is eyes for the blind, strength for the weak, and a shield for the defenseless. He stands erect by bending above the fallen. He rises by lifting others.

As long as a man lives he should study. Death alone has the right to dismiss the school.

The old doctrine that God wanted man to do something for him, and that he kept a watchful eye upon all the children of men; that he rewarded the virtuous and punished the wicked, is gradually fading from the mind. We know that some of the worst men have what the world calls success. We know that some of the best men lie upon the straw of failure. We know that honesty goes hungry, while larceny sits at the banquet. We know that the vicious have every physical comfort, while the virtuous are often clad in rags.

Let us account for all we see by the facts we know. If there are things for which we cannot account, let us wait for light. To account for anything by supernatural agencies is, in fact to say that we do not know. Theology is not what we know about God, but what we do not know about Nature.

Religion has not civilized man, man has civilized religion.

Why should we postpone our joy to another world? Let us get all we can of the good between the cradle and the grave, all that we can of the truly dramatic. If, when death comes, that is the end, we have at least made the best of this life.

What light is to the eyes - what air is to the lungs - what love is to the heart, liberty is to the soul of man.

Ignorance is the soil in which belief in miracles grows.

If a man really believes that God once upheld slavery; that he commanded soldiers to kill women and babes; that he believed in polygamy; that he persecuted for opinion's sake; that he will punish forever, and that he hates an unbeliever, the effect in my judgment will be bad. It always has been bad. This belief built the dungeons of the Inquisition. This belief made the Puritan murder the Quaker.

If the people were a little more ignorant, astrology would flourish - if a little more enlightened, religion would perish.

Too much doubt is better than too much credulity.

My principal objections to orthodox religion are two: slavery here and hell hereafter.

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.

This is my creed: Happiness is the only good; reason the only torch; justice the only worship, humanity the only religion, and love the only priest.

If the account given in Genesis is really true, ought we not, after all, to thank this serpent? He was the first schoolmaster, the first advocate of learning, the first enemy of ignorance, the first to whisper in human ears the sacred word liberty, the creator of ambition, the author of modesty, of inquiry, of doubt, of investigation, of progress and of civilization.

It is a thousand times better to have common sense without education than to have education without common sense.

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

If I owe Smith ten dollars and God forgives me, that doesn't pay Smith.

In the republic of mediocrity, genius is dangerous.

Whenever a man believes that he has the exact truth from God, there is in that man no spirit of compromise. He has not the modesty born of the imperfections of human nature; he has the arrogance of theological certainty and the tyranny born of ignorant assurance. Believing himself to be the slave of God, he imitates his master, and of all tyrants the worst is a slave in power.

If 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?

And yet this same Deity says to me, resist not evil; pray for those that despitefully use you; love your enemies, but I will eternally damn mine. It seems to me that even gods should practice what they preach.

As we become civilized we are governed less by persons and more by principles. . . . The best of all leaders is the man who teaches people to lead themselves.

While I am opposed to all orthodox creeds, I have a creed myself; and my creed is this. Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so. This creed is somewhat short, but it is long enough for this life, strong enough for this world. If there is another world, when we get there we can make another creed.

It is an old habit with theologians to beat the living with the bones of the dead.

If abuses are destroyed, man must destroy them. If slaves are freed, man must free them. If new truths are discovered, man must discover them. If the naked are clothed; if the hungry are fed; if justice is done; if labor is rewarded; if superstition is driven from the mind; if the defenseless are protected, and if the right finally triumphs, all must be the work of man. The grand victories of the future must be won by man, and by man alone.

Think of the egotism of a man who believes that an infinite being wants his praise!

God so loved the world that he made up his mind to damn a large majority of the human race.

Christianity did not come with tidings of great joy, but with a message of eternal grief. It came with the threat of everlasting torture on its lips. It meant war on earth and perdition hereafter.

The Emperor Constantine, who lifted Christianity into power, murdered his wife Fausta, and his eldest son Crispus, the same year that he convened the Council of Nice to decide whether Jesus Christ was a man or the Son of God. The council decided that Christ was consubstantial with the father. This was in the year 325. We are thus indebted to a wife-murderer for settling the vexed question of the divinity of the Savior.

The Church has always been willing to swap off treasures in heaven for cash down.

Strange but true: those who have loved God most have loved men least.

We rise by lifting others.

My objection to Christianity is that it is infinitely cruel, infinitely selfish, and, I might add, infinitely absurd.

Theology is not what we know about God, but what we do not know about Nature.

I am the inferior of any man whose rights I trample under foot. Men are not superior by reason of accidents of race or color. They are superior who have the best heart-the best brain.

Intellectual liberty is the air of the soul, the sunshine of the mind, and without it, the world is a prison, the universe is a dungeon.

The true civilization is where every man gives to every other every right that he claims for himself.

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.

Few nations have been so poor as to have but one god. Gods were made so easily, and the raw material cost so little, that generally the god market was fairly glutted and heaven crammed with these phantoms.

I am not so much for the freedom of religion as I am for the religion of freedom.

There can be but little liberty on earth while men worship a tyrant in heaven.

Colleges are places where pebbles are polished and diamonds are dimmed.

And why does this same God tell me how to raise my children when he had to drown his?

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

They say that when god was in Jerusalem he forgave his murderers, but now he will not forgive an honest man for differing with him on the subject of the Trinity. They say that God says to me, "Forgive your enemies." I say, "I do;" but he says, "I will damn mine." God should be consistent. If he wants me to forgive my enemies he should forgive his. I am asked to forgive enemies who can hurt me. God is only asked to forgive enemies who cannot hurt him. He certainly ought to be as generous as he asks us to be.

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 ninety-nine chances in a hundred she is raising kindling wood for hell.

Do you not know that every religion in the world has declared every other religion a fraud? Yes, we all know it. That is the time all religions tell the truth - each of the other.

The priests of one religion never credit the miracles of another religion. Is this because priests instinctively know priests?

There is something wrong in a government where they who do the most have the least. There is something wrong when honesty wears a rag, and rascality a robe; when the loving, the tender, east a crust, while the infamous sit at banquets.

The church hates a thinker precisely for the same reason a robber dislikes a sheriff, or a thief despises the prosecuting witness.

The glory of science is, that it is freeing the soul, breaking the mental manacles, getting the brain out of bondage, giving courage to thought, filling the world with mercy, justice, and joy.

I will follow my logic, no matter where it goes, after it has consulted with my heart. If you ever come to a conclusion without calling the heart in, you will come to a bad conclusion.

So, ministers say that they teach charity. This is natural. They live on alms. All beggars teach that others should give.

In nature there are neither rewards nor punishments; there are consequences.

The myth of hell represents 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.

Happiness is not a reward - it is a consequence. Suffering is not a punishment - it is a result.

Fear paints pictures of ghosts and hangs them in the gallery of ignorance.

Hope is the only bee that makes honey without flowers.

It is a splendid thing to think that the woman you really love will never grow old to you. Through the wrinkles of time, through the mask of years, if you really love her, you will always see the face you love and won. And a woman who really loves a man does not see that he grows old; he is not decrepit to her; she always sees the same gallant gentleman who won her hand and heart.

Ignorance worships mystery; reason explains it; the one grovels, the other soars.

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.

If nobody has too much, everybody will have enough.

This crime called blasphemy was invented by priests for the purpose of defending doctrines not able to take care of themselves.

Every pulpit is a pillory, in which stands a hired culprit, defending the justice of his own imprisonment.

It seems to me impossible for a civilized man to love or worship, or respect the God of the Old Testament. A really civilized man, a really civilized woman, must hold such a God in abhorrence and contempt.

I am a believer in liberty . That is my religion to give to every other human being every right that I claim for myself, and I grant to every other human being, not the right because it is his right but instead of granting I declare that it is his right, to attack every doctrine that I maintain, to answer every argument that I may urge in other words, he must have absolute freedom of speech.

Religion can never reform mankind because religion is slavery.

It is better to deserve without receiving than to receive without deserving

The more false we destroy, the more room there will be for the true.

The man who accepts opinions because they have been entertained by distinguished people, is a mental snob.

Would God give a bird wings and make it a crime to fly? Would he give me brains and make it a crime to think? Any God that would damn one of his children for the expression of his honest thought wouldn't make a decent thief. When I read a book and don't believe it, I ought to say so. I will do so and take the consequences like a man.

Upon the great questions of origin, of destiny, of immortality, of . . . other worlds, every honest man must say, 'I do not know.' Upon these questions, this is the creed of intelligence.

Blasphemy is an epithet bestowed by superstition upon common sense.

The doctrine of eternal punishment is in perfect harmony with the savagery of the men who made the orthodox creeds. It is in harmony with torture, with flaying alive, and with burnings.

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.

It is a blessed thing that in every age some one has had the individuality enough and courage enough to stand by his own convictions.

The hands that help are better far than lips that pray.

Age after age, the strong have trampled upon the weak; the crafty and heartless have ensnared and enslaved the simple and innocent, and nowhere, in all the annals of mankind, has any god succored the oppressed