Positive atheism Quotes · Page 18

That which shows God in me, fortifies me. That which shows God out of me, makes me a wart and a wen.

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Spirit lurks within the Flesh Like Tides within the Sea That make the Water live, estranged What would the Either be?

— Emily Dickinson

Prayer may be elevating if combined with work, and they who labor with head, hands or feet have faith and are generally…

— Luther Burbank

The possession of unlimited power corrodes the conscience, hardens the heart, and confounds the understanding.

— Lord Acton

Love and art do not embrace what is beautiful but what is made beautiful by this embrace.

— Karl Kraus

My own view on religion is that of Lucretius. I regard it as a disease born of fear and as a source…

— Bertrand Russell

People who are aware of, and ashamed of, their prejudices are well on the road to eliminating them.

— Gordon Allport

Do people ever reflect, one wonders, that the best way to protect against the penetration of one's secrets by others is to…

— George F. Kennan

If the assertion that there is a god is nonsensical, then the atheist's assertion that there is no god is equally nonsensical,…

— A.J. Ayer

If, with all the time at my disposal, with all the wealth of the resources of this vast universe, to do with…

— Robert Green Ingersoll

I purpose publishing these Letters here in the world before I return to you. Two editions. One, unedited, for Bible readers and…

— Mark Twain

On Earth, Discord! A gloomy Heaven above, opening her jealous gates to the nineteen thousandth part of the tithe of mankind! And…

— Robert Burns

Religious doctrines would do well to withdraw their pretension to be dealing with matters of fact. That pretension is not only the…

— George Santayana

Is poverty of spirit the chief amongst virtues, that Jesus gives it prime place in his teachings? Is it even a virtue…

— Charles Bradlaugh

The nineteenth century is a turning point in history, simply on account of the work of two men, Darwin and Renan, the…

— Oscar Wilde

To justify Christian morality because it provides a foundation of morality, instead of showing the necessity of Christian morality from the truth…

— T. S. Eliot

My chief aim was to combat the view that there can be no true morality without supernatural sanctions. So I argued at…

— Margaret E. Knight

If human nature does alter it will be because individuals manage to look at themselves in a new way. Here and there…

— E. M. Forster

Longhaired preachers come out every night, Tryin' to tell us what's wrong and what's right. But when asked about something to eat,…

— Joe Hill

Here the only genuine conflict is between true believers. Of a given text in Holy Writ one faction may say this thing…

— H. L. Mencken

No man must encroach upon my province, nor I upon his. He may advise me, moderately and without pertinaciousness, but he must…

— William Godwin

I had always been scrupulously careful to avoid the smallest suggestion of infant indoctrination, which I think is ultimately responsible for much…

— Richard Dawkins

There was the strangest combination of church influence against me. Baker is a Campbellite; and therefore, as I suppose with few exceptions,…

— Abraham Lincoln

Although I'm not Christian, I was raised Christian. I'm an atheist, with a slight Buddhist leaning. I've got a very strong sense…

— Rachel Griffiths

What preoccupies us, then, is not God as a fact of nature, but as a fabrication useful for a God-fearing society. God…

— Daniel J. Boorstin

The ethical view of the universe involves us in so many cruel and absurd contradictions that I have come to suspect that…

— Joseph Conrad

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

— Bertrand Russell

We will no longer be oppressed by the fascism called Christianity. We will no longer be oppressed by the mentality of the…

— Marilyn Manson

Every step which the intelligence of Europe has taken has been in spite of the clerical party.

— Victor Hugo

A normal feminine influence in recasting our religious assumptions will do more than any other one thing to improve the world.

— Charlotte Perkins Gilman

It is characteristic of theistic "tolerance" that no one really cares what the people believe in, just so they believe or pretend…

— Emma Goldman

The state authorities have no place in the church of God, no right to control and persecute the conscience.

— Hans Denck

In our country we ask no toleration for religion and its free exercise, but we claim it as an inalienable right.

— Philip Schaff

Truth, Sir, is a cow which will yield such people no more milk, and so they are gone to milk the bull.

— Samuel Johnson

The law for religious freedom... [has]put down the aristocracy of the clergy and restored to the citizen the freedom of the mind.

— Thomas Jefferson

Christianity gave eroticism its savor of sin and legend when it endowed the human female with a soul.

— Simone de Beauvoir

The star of the Magi which pointed so unerringly to the cradle of Christ points not less unerringly to one of the…

— John Remsburg

The orthodox faith painted God as a revengeful being, and yet people talk about loving such a being.

— P. T. Barnum

You've got to be digging it while it's happening 'cause it just might be a one shot deal.

— Frank Zappa

We grovel and "worship" and pray to God to do what we ourselves ought to have done a thousand years ago, and…

— Charlotte Perkins Gilman