"He must be able to hear them [the counter arguments] from persons who actually believe them; who defend them in earnest, and do their very utmost for them. He must know them in their most plausible and persuasive form; he must feel the whole force of the difficulty which the true view of the subject has to encounter and dispose of; else he will never really possess himself of the portion of truth which meets and removes that difficulty."
Atheism quotes
Atheism
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Atheism quotes (page 36 of 103)
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"Morality does not depend on religion."
"Surely our clergy need not be surprised at the daily increasing distrust in the public mind of the efficacy of prayer."
"The frightful engines of ecclesiastical councils, of diabolical malice, and Calvinistical good-nature never failed to terrify me exceedingly whenever I thought of preaching."
"It is far more probable that our senses should deceive us, than that an old woman should be carried up a chimney on a broom stick; and that it is far less astonishing that witnesses should lie, than that witches should perform the acts that were alleged."
"The corruption of the age is made up by the particular contribution of every individual man; some contribute treachery, others injustice, atheism, tyranny, avarice, cruelty, according to their power."
"Death pays all debts."
"Man appoints, and God disappoints."
"Ah, the bitter, hopeless heart-hunger of godlessness none but an atheist can understand!"
"Thanks to the toleration preached by the encyclopedists of the eighteenth century, the sorcerer is exempt from torture."
"Thank Heaven, the female heart is untenantable by atheism."
"A material resurrection seems strange and even absurd except for purposes of punishment, and all punishment which is to revenge rather than correct must be morally wrong, and when the World is at an end, what moral or warning purpose can eternal tortures answer?"
"Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded. That all the Apostles would have done as they did."
"Bryan - a great friend of mine, by the way - had a Neanderthal type of head, Burbank says. As to Riley, he has not even the oratorical skill of Bryan. The whole movement is based on the poor whites of the south."
"Nature is not personal. She is the compound of all these processes which move through the universe to effect the results we know as Life and of all the ordinances which govern that universe and that make Life continuous. She is no more the Hebrew's Jehovah than she is the Physicist's Force; she is as much Providence as she is Electricity; she is not the Great Pattern any more than she is the Blind Chance."
"Of course it must, and our scientific men must be criticized boldly. They will not feel comfortable when you and I are through with them."
"Obsolete misleading theologies bear the same relation to the essence of true religion that scarlet fever, mumps, and measles do to education."
"What is the use of assuring Fundamentalists that science is compatible with religion. They retort at once, Certainly not with our religion."