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Great Part Of That Order Which Reigns Among Mankind Is Not The Effect Of Government. It Has Its Origin In The Principles Of Society And The Natural Constitution Of Man. It Existed Prior To Government, And Would Exist If The Formality Of Government Was Abolished. The Mutual Dependence And Reciprocal Interest Which Man Has Upon Man, And All The Parts Of Civilised Community Upon Each Other, Create That Great Chain Of Connection Which Holds It Together.

-Thomas Paine

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Great Part Of That

Thomas Paine

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Great Part Of That Order Which Reigns Among Mankind Is Not The Effect Of Government. It Has Its Origin In The Principles Of Society And The Natural Constitution Of Man. It Existed Prior To Government, And Would Exist If The Formality Of Government Was Abolished. The Mutual Dependence And Reciprocal Interest Which Man Has Upon Man, And All The Parts Of Civilised Community Upon Each Other, Create That Great Chain Of Connection Which Holds It Together.

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Men Who Look Upon Themselves Born To Reign, And Others To Obey, Soon Grow Insolent; Selected From The Rest Of Mankind Their Minds Are Early Poisoned By Importance.

Yet This Is Trash That The Church Imposes Upon The World As The Word Of God; This Is The Collection Of Lies And Contradictions Called The Holy Bible! This Is The Rubbish Called Revealed Religion!

It Is For The Good Of Nations, And Not For The Emolument Or Aggrandizement Of Particular Individuals, That Government Ought To Be Established, And That Mankind Are At The Expense Of Supporting It. The Defects Of Every Government And Constitution Both As To Principle And Form, Must, On A Parity Of Reasoning, Be As Open To Discussion As The Defects Of A Law, And It Is A Duty Which Every Man Owes To Society To Point Them Out.

For All Men Being Originally Equals, No One By Birth Could Have The Right To Set Up His Own Family In Perpetual Preference To All Others Forever, And Tho' Himself Might Deserve Some Decent Degree Of Honours Of His Cotemporaries, Yet His Descendants Might Be Far Too Unworthy To Inherit Them.

Suspicion And Persecution Are Weeds Of The Same Dunghill, And Flourish Best Together.

Universal Empire Is The Prerogative Of A Writer. His Concerns Are With All Mankind, And Though He Cannot Command Their Obedience,he Can Assign Them Their Duty. The Republic Of Letters Is More Ancient Than Monarchy, And Of Far Higher Character In The World Than The Vassal Court Of Britain.

He Who Takes Nature For His Guide, Is Not Easily Beaten Out Of His Argument

Man Is Not The Enemy Of Man, But Through The Medium Of A False System Of Government. Instead, Therefore, Of Exclaiming Against The Ambition Of Kings, The Exclamation Should Be Directed Against The Principle Of Such Governments; And Instead Of Seeking To Reform The Individual, The Wisdom Of A Nation Should Apply Itself To Reform The System.

Any System Of Religion That Has Anything In It That Shocks The Mind Of A Child, Cannot Be True.

My Country Is Wherever Liberty Lives.

To Say That Any People Are Not Fit For Freedom, Is To Make Poverty Their Choice, And To Say They Had Rather Be Loaded With Taxes Than Not.

No Man Is Prejudiced In Favor Of A Thing, Knowing It To Be Wrong. He Is Attached To It On The Belief Of Its Being Right; And When He Sees It Is Not So, The Prejudice Will Be Gone.

Moderation In Temper Is Always A Virtue; But Moderation In Principle Is Always A Vice.

It Has Been The Political Career Of This Man To Begin With Hypocrisy, Proceed With Arrogance, And Finish With Contempt

Better Fare Hard With Good Men Than Feast It With Bad.

In A General View, There Are Few Conquests That Repay The Charge Of Making Them, And Mankind Are Pretty Well Convinced That It Can Never Be Worth Their While To Go To War For Profit's Sake. If They Are Made War Upon, Their Country Invaded, Or Their Existence At Stake, It Is Their Duty To Defend And Preserve Themselves, But In Every Other Light, And From Every Other Cause, Is War Inglorious And Detestable.

To Establish Any Mode To Abolish War, However Advantageous It Might Be To Nations, Would Be To Take From Such Government The Most Lucrative Of Its Branches.

Our Citizenship In The United States Is Our National Character. Our Citizenship In Any Particular State Is Only Our Local Distinction. By The Latter We Are Known At Home, By The Former To The World. Our Great Title Is Americans.

Society Is Produced By Our Wants, And Government By Wickedness; The Former Promotes Our Happiness Positively By Uniting Our Affections, The Latter Negatively By Restraining Our Vices. The One Encourages Intercourse, The Other Creates Distinctions. The First Is A Patron, The Last A Punisher.

The More Acquisitions The Government Makes Abroad, The More Taxes The People Have To Pay At Home.

Government Is Best Which Governs Least

Democracies Have

It Is A General Idea, That When Taxes Are Once Laid On, They Are Never Taken Off.

The Continual Whine Of Lamenting The Burden Of Taxes, However Successfully It May Be Practiced In Mixed Governments, Is Inconsistent With The Sense And Spirit Of A Republic. If Taxes Are Necessary, They Are Of Course Advantageous, But If They Require An Apology, The Apology Itself Implies An Impeachment. Why, Then, Is Man Imposed Upon, Or Why Does He Impose Upon Himself?

Change Of Ministers Amounts To Nothing. One Goes Out, Another Comes In, And Still The Same Measures, Vices, And Extravagances Are Pursued. It Signifies Not Who Is Minister. The Defect Lies In The System. The Foundation And Superstructure Of The Government Is Bad. Prop It As You Please, It Continually Sinks And Ever Will.

I Have Never Made It A Consideration Whether The Subject Was Popular Or Unpopular, But Whether It Was Right Or Wrong; For That Which Is Right Will Become Popular, And That Which Is Wrong, Though By Mistake It May Obtain The Cry Or Fashion Of The Day, Will Soon Lose The Power Of Delusion, And Sink Into Disesteem.

The Creation Is The Bible Of The Deist. He There Reads, In The Handwriting Of The Creator Himself, The Certainty Of His Existence And The Immutability Of His Power, And All Other Bibles And Testaments Are To Him Forgeries.

Had The News Of Salvation By Jesus Christ Been Inscribed On The Face Of The Sun And The Moon, In Characters That All Nations Would Have Understood, The Whole Earth Had Known It In Twenty-four Hours, And All Nations Would Have Believed It; Whereas, Though It Is Now Almost Two Thousand Years Since, As They Tell Us, Christ Came Upon Earth, Not A Twentieth Part Of The People Of The Earth Know Anything Of It, And Among Those Who Do, The Wiser Part Do Not Believe It.

When The Tongue Or The Pen Is Let Loose In A Frenzy Of Passion, It Is The Man, And Not The Subject, That Becomes Exhausted.

O Ye That Love Mankind! Ye That Dare Oppose, Not Only The Tyranny, But The Tyrant, Stand Forth! Every Spot Of The Old World Is Overrun With Oppression. Freedom Hath Been Hunted Round The Globe. Asia, And Africa, Have Long Expelled Her. Europe Regards Her Like A Stranger, And England Hath Given Her Warning To Depart. O! Receive The Fugitive, And Prepare In Time An Asylum For Mankind.

In The Early Ages Of The World, According To The Scripture Chronology, There Were No Kings; The Consequence Of Which Was There Were No Wars; It Is The Pride Of Kings Which Throws Mankind Into Confusion.

What At First Was Plunder Assumed The Softer Name Of Revenue.

Civilization, Or That Which Is So Called, Has Operated Two Ways To Make One Part Of Society More Affluent And The Other Part More Wretched Than Would Have Been The Lot Of Either In A Natural State.

Of All The Systems Of Religion That Ever Were Invented, There Is No More Derogatory To The Almighty, More Unedifying To Man, More Repugnant To Reason, And More Contradictory To Itself Than This Thing Called Christianity. Too Absurd For Belief, Too Impossible To Convince, And Too Inconsistent For Practice, It Renders The Heart Torpid Or Produces Only Atheists Or Fanatics. As An Engine Of Power, It Serves The Purpose Of Despotism, And As A Means Of Wealth, The Avarice Of Priests, But So Far As Respects The Good Of Man In General It Leads To Nothing Here Or Hereafter.

The Animals To Whom Nature Has Given The Faculty We Call Cunning Know Always When To Use It, And Use It Wisely; But When Man Descends To Cunning He Blunders And Betrays.

Arms Discourage And Keep The Invader And Plunderer In Awe, And Preserve Order In The World As Well As Property... Horrid Mischief Would Ensue Were The Law-abiding Deprived Of The Use Of Them.

Youth Is The Seed Time Of Good Habits, As Well In Nations As In Individuals.

The Mind Once Enlightened Cannot Again Become Dark.

We Can Only Reason From What Is; We Can Reason On Actualities, But Not On Possibilities.

The New Testament, They Tell Us, Is Founded Upon The Prophecies Of The Old; If So, It Must Follow The Fate Of Its Foundation.

Each Government Accuses The Other Of Perfidy, Intrigue And Ambition, As A Means Of Heating The Imagination Of Their Respective Nations, And Incensing Them To Hostilities. Man Is Not The Enemy Of Man, But Through The Medium Of A False System Of Government.

Now, Which Am I To Believe, A Book That Any Impostor Might Make And Call The Word Of God, Or The Creation Itself Which None But An Almighty Power Could Make? For The Bible Says One Thing; And The Creation Says The Contrary. The Bible Represents God With All The Passions Of A Mortal, And The Creation Proclaims Him With All The Attributes Of A God.

As To The Book Called The Bible, It Is Blasphemy To Call It The Word Of God. It Is A Book Of Lies And Contradictions And A History Of Bad Times And Bad Men.

I Bring Reason To Your Ears, And, In Language As Plain As Abc, Hold Up Truth To Your Eyes.

Let It Be Told To The Future World, That In The Depth Of Winter, When Nothing But Hope And Virtue Could Survive, That The City And The Country, Alarmed At One Common Danger, Came Forth To Meet And To Repulse It. Say Not That Thousands Are Gone, Turn Out Your Tens Of Thousands; Throw Not The Burden Of The Day Upon Providence, But "show Your Faith By Your Works," That God May Bless You. It Matters Not Where You Live, Or What Rank Of Life You Hold, The Evil Or The Blessing Will Reach You All.

How Necessary It Is At All Times To Watch Against The Attempted Encroachment Of Power, And To Prevent Its Running To Excess.

We Have It In Our Power To Begin The World Over Again.

Every Age And Generation Must Be As Free To Act For Itself In All Cases As The Ages And Generations Which Preceded It. The Vanity And Presumption Of Governing Beyond The Grave Is The Most Ridiculous And Insolent Of All Tyrannies.

Is It Because You Are Sunk In The Cruelty Of Superstition, Or Feel No Interest In The Honor Of Your Creator, That You Listen To The Horrid Tales Of The Bible, Or Hear Them With Callous Indifference?

The Earth, In Its Natural, Uncultivated State Was, And Ever Would Have Continued To Be, The Common Property Of The Human Race." As The Land Gets Cultivated, "it Is The Value Of The Improvement, Only, And Not The Earth Itself, That Is In Individual Property. Every Proprietor, Therefore, Of Cultivated Lands, Owes To The Community A Ground-rent..to Every Person, Rich Or Poor...because It Is In Lieu Of The Natural Inheritance, Which, As A Right, Belongs To Every Man, Over And Above The Property He May Have Created, Or Inherited From Those Who Did

Customs Will Often Outlive The Remembrance Of Their Origin.

Positive Atheism

Priests And Conjurors Are Of The Same Trade.

Men Who Look Upon Themselves Born To Reign, And Others To Obey, Soon Grow Insolent; Selected From The Rest Of Mankind Their Minds Are Early Poisoned By Importance; And The World They Act In Differs So Materially From The World At Large, That They Have But Little Opportunity Of Knowing Its True Interests, And When They Succeed To The Government Are Frequently The Most Ignorant And Unfit Of Any Throughout The Dominions.

It Is An Affront To Treat Falsehood With Complaisance.

A Little Matter Will Move A Party, But It Must Be Something Great That Moves A Nation.

When A Man Has So Far Corrupted And Prostituted The Chastity Of His Mind, As To [profess] Things He Does Not Believe, He Has Prepared Himself For The Commission Of Every Other Crime.

The Bible: A History Of Wickedness That Has Served To Corrupt And Brutalise Mankind.

If Those To Whom Power Is Delegated Do Well, They Will Be Respected; If Not, They Will Be Despised.

In The Progress Of Politics, As In The Common Occurrences Of Life, We Are Not Only Apt To Forget The Ground We Have Travelled Over, But Frequently Neglect To Gather Up Experiences As We Go.

Let Them Call Me Rebel, And Welcome, I Feel No Concern From It.

Great Part Of That Order Which Reigns Among Mankind Is Not The Effect Of Government. It Has Its Origin In The Principles Of Society And The Natural Constitution Of Man. It Existed Prior To Government, And Would Exist If The Formality Of Government Was Abolished. The Mutual Dependence And Reciprocal Interest Which Man Has Upon Man, And All The Parts Of Civilised Community Upon Each Other, Create That Great Chain Of Connection Which Holds It Together.

War Ought To Be No Man's Wish.

...it Would Be More Consistent That We Call [the Bible] The Work Of A Demon Than The Word Of God. It Is A History Of Wickedness That Has Served To Corrupt And Brutalize Mankind.

...the Individuals Themselves, Each In His Own Personal And Sovereign Right, Entered Into A Compact With Each Other To Produce A Government: And This Is The Only Mode In Which Governments Have A Right To Arise, And The Only Principle On Which They Have A Right To Exist.

Public Money Ought To Be Touched With The Most Scrupulous Conscientiousness Of Honor. It Is Not The Produce Of Riches Only, But Of The Hard Earnings Of Labor And Poverty. It Is Drawn Even From The Bitterness Of Want And Misery. Not A Beggar Passes, Or Perishes In The Streets, Whose Mite Is Not In That Mass.

"government," Says Swift, "is A Plain Thing, And Fitted To The Capacity Of Many Heads."

Truth Never Envelops Itself In Mystery, And The Mystery In Which It Is At Any Time Enveloped Is The Work Of Its Antagonist, And Never Of Itself.

It Is Painful To Behold A Man Employing His Talents To Corrupt Himself.

He Is Not Affected By The Reality Of Distress Touching His Heart, But By The Showy Resemblance Of It Striking His Imagination. He Pities The Plumage, But Forgets The Dying Bird.

As My Object Was Not Myself, I Set Out With The Determination, And Happily With The Disposition, Of Not Being Moved By Praise Or Censure, Friendship Or Calumny, Nor Of Being Drawn From My Purpose By Any Personal Altercation; And The Man Who Cannot Do This, Is Not Fit For A Public Character.

The Final Event To Himself Has Been, That As He Rose Like A Rocket, He Fell Like The Stick.

Every National Church Or Religion Has Established Itself By Pretending Some Special Mission From God, Communicated To Certain Individuals. The Jews Have Their Moses; The Christians Their Jesus Christ, Their Apostles And Saints; And The Turks Their Mahomet; As If The Way To God Was Not Open To Every Man Alike.

He That Would Make His Own Liberty Secure, Must Guard Even His Enemy From Oppression; For If He Violates This Duty, He Establishes A Precedent That Will Reach To Himself.

It Is Not Because A Part Of The Government Is Elective, That Makes It Less A Despotism, If The Persons So Elected, Possess Afterwards, As A Parliament, Unlimited Powers. Election, In This Case, Becomes Separated From Representation, And The Candidates Are Candidates For Despotism.

It Will Be Proper To Take A Review Of The Several Sources From Which Governments Have Arisen, And On Which They Have Been Founded.

It Is From The Bible That Man Has Learned Cruelty, Rapine, And Murder; For The Belief Of A Cruel God Makes A Cruel Man.

The Right Of Voting For Representatives , Is The Primary Right By Which Other Rights Are Protected.

Representatives

Where There Are No Distinctions There Can Be No Superiority; Perfect Equality Affords No Temptation.

It Is The Direction And Not The Magnitude Which Is To Be Taken Into Consideration.

Of More Worth Is One Honest Man To Society, And In The Sight Of God, Than All The Crowned Ruffians That Ever Lived.

Science Is The True Theology.

We Repose An Unwise Confidence In Any Government, Or In Any Men, When We Invest Them Officially With Too Much, Or An Unnecessary Quantity Of, Discretionary Power.

Wisdom Is Not The Purchase Of A Day

Of All The Systems Of Religion That Ever Were Invented, There Is No More Derogatory To The Almighty, More Unedifiying To Man, More Repugnant To Reason, And More Contradictory To Itself Than This Thing Called Christianity.

When I See Throughout This Book, Called The Bible, A History Of The Grossest Vices And A Collection Of The Most Paltry And Contemptible Tales And Stories, I Could Not So Dishonor My Creator By Calling It By His Name.

Whenever We Read The Obscene Stories, The Voluptuous Debaucheries, The Cruel And Tortuous Executions, The Unrelenting Vindictiveness With Which More Than Half The Bible Is Filled, It Would Be More Consistent That We Call It The Word Of A Demon Than The Word Of God. It Is A History Of Wickedness That Has Served To Corrupt And Brutalize Humankind.

That God Cannot Lie, Is No Advantage To Your Argument, Because It Is No Proof That Priests Can Not, Or That The Bible Does Not.

It Is Only By The Exercise Of Reason That Man Can Discover God.

There Is No Greater Tyranny Than That Of The Dead Over The Living.

Nothing But Heaven Is Impregnable To Vice.

Human Language Is Local And Changeable, And Is Therefore Incapable Of Being Used As The Means Of Unchangeable And Universal Information.

The Protection Of A Man's Person Is More Sacred Than The Protection Of His Property.

When My Country, Into Which I Had Just Set My Foot, Was Set On Fire About My Ears, It Was Time To Stir. It Was Time For Every Man To Stir.

Tears May Soothe The Wounds They Cannot Heal.

It Is From The Power Of Taxation Being In The Hands Of Those Who Can Throw So Great A Part Of It From Their Own Shoulders, That It Has Raged Without A Check.

It Can Only Be By Blinding The Understanding Of Man, And Making Him Believe That Government Is Some Wonderful Mysterious Thing, That Excessive Revenues Are Obtained. Monarchy Is Well Calculated To Ensure This End. It Is The Popery Of Government; A Thing Kept Up To Amuse The Ignorant, And Quiet Them Into Taxes.

Mysterious Things

Take Away From Genesis The Belief That Moses Was The Author, On Which Only The Strange Believe That It Is The Word Of God Has Stood, And There Remains Nothing Of Genesis But An Anonymous Book Of Stories, Fables, And Traditionary Or Invented Absurdities, Or Of Downright Lies.

It Is A Fool Only, And Not The Philosopher, Nor Even The Prudent Man, That Will Live As If There Were No God... Were A Man Impressed As Fully And Strongly As He Ought To Be With The Belief Of A God, His Moral Life Would Be Regulated By The Force Of Belief; He Would Stand In Awe Of God And Of Himself, And Would Not Do The Thing That Could Not Be Concealed From Either.

Natural Rights Are Those Which Always Appertain To Man In Right Of His Existence. Of This Kind Are All The Intellectual Rights, Or Rights Of The Mind, And Also All Those Rights Of Acting As An Individual For His Own Comfort And Happiness, Which Are Not Injurious To The Rights Of Others.

If, To Expose The Fraud And Imposition Of Monarchy . . . To Promote Universal Peace, Civilization, And Commerce, And To Break The Chains Of Political Superstition, And Raise Degraded Man To His Proper Rank; If These Things Be Libellous . . . Let The Name Of Libeller Be Engraved On My Tomb

Wherefore, Security Being The True Design And End Of Government, It Unanswerably Follows That Whatever Form Thereof Appears Most Likely To Ensure It To Us, With The Least Expense And Greatest Benefit, Is Preferable To All Others.

It Is Unnatural That A Pure Stream Should Flow From A Foul Fountain Its Vices Are But A Continuation Of The Vices Of Its Origin. A Man Of Moral Honor And Good Political Principles, Cannot Submit To The Mean Drudgery And Disgraceful Arts, By Which Such Elections Are Carried. To Be A Successful Candidate, He Must Be Destitute Of The Qualities That Constitute A Just Legislator: And Being Thus Disciplined To Corruption It Is Not To Be Expected That The Representative Should Be Better Than The Man.

I Do Not Believe In The Creed Professed By Any Church That I Know Of. Each Of These Churches Accuse The Other Of Unbelief; And For My Part, I Disbelieve Them All.

Man Did Not Make The Earth, And Though He Had A Natural Right To Occupy It, He Had No Right To Locate As His Property In Perpetuity, Any Part Of It.

Each Of Those Churches Shows Certain Books, Which They Call Revelation, Or The Word Of God. The Jews Say That Their Word Of God Was Given By God To Moses Face To Face; The Christians Say, That Their Word Of God Came By Divine Inspiration; And The Turks Say, That Their Word Of God (the Koran) Was Brought By An Angel From Heaven. Each Of Those Churches Accuses The Other Of Unbelief; And, For My Own Part, I Disbelieve Them All.

It Is The Duty Of Every True Deist To Vindicate The Moral Justice Of God Against The Evils Of The Bible.

We Hold The Moral Obligation Of Providing For Old Age, Helpless Infancy, And Poverty Is Far Superior To That Of Supplying The Invented Wants Of Courtly Extravagance.

I Detest The Bible As I Detest Everything That Is Cruel.

The Church Was Resolved To Have A New Testament, And As, After The Lapse Of More Than Three Hundred Years, No Handwriting Could Be Proved Or Disproved, The Church, Which Like Former Impostors Had Then Gotten Possession Of The State, Had Everything Its Own Way. It Invented Creeds, Such As That Called The Apostle's Creed, The Nicean Creed, The Athanasian Creed, And Out Of The Loads Of Rubbish That Were Presented It Voted Four To Be Gospels, And Others To Be Epistles, As We Now Find Them Arranged.

Call To Mind The Sentiments Which Nature Has Engraved On The Heart Of Every Citizen, And Which Take A New Force When They Are Solemnly Recognised By All:-for A Nation To Love Liberty, It Is Sufficient That She Knows It; And To Be Free, It Is Sufficient That She Wills It.

To Reason With Goverments, As They Have Existed For Ages, Is To Argue With Brutes. It Is Only From The Nations Themselves That Reforms Can Be Expected

Rights Are Not Gifts From One Man To Another, Nor From One Class Of Men To Another. It Is Impossible To Discover Any Origin Of Rights Otherwise Than In The Origin Of Man; It Consequently Follows That Rights Appertain To Man In Right Of His Existence, And Must Therefore Be Equal To Every Man.

Our Greatest Enemies, The Ones We Must Fight Most Often, Are Within.

Men Did Not Make The Earth... It Is The Value Of The Improvements Only, And Not The Earth Itself, That Is Individual Property. ... Every Proprietor Owes To The Community A Ground Rent For The Land Which He Holds.

The Abilities Of Man Must Fall Short On One Side Or The Other, Like Too Scanty A Blanket When You Are Abed. If You Pull It Upon Your Shoulders, Your Feet Are Left Bare; If You Thrust It Down To Your Feet, Your Shoulders Are Uncovered.

To Argue With A Man Who Has Renounced The Use And Authority Of Reason, And Whose Philosophy Consists In Holding Humanity In Contempt, Is Like Administering Medicine To The Dead, Or Endeavoring To Convert An Atheist By Scripture.

Every Proprietor Owes To The Community A Ground-rent For The Land Which He Holds.

War Involves In Its Progress Such A Train Of Unforeseen Circumstances That No Human Wisdom Can Calculate The End; It Has But One Thing Certain, And That Is To Increase Taxes.

The Sun Never Shined On A Cause Of Greater Worth.

Of All The Tyrannies That Affect Mankind, Tyranny In Religion Is The Worst.

The Christian Religion Is A Parody On The Worship Of The Sun, In Which They Put A Man Called Christ In The Place Of The Sun, And Pay Him The Adoration Originally Payed To The Sun.

It Is A Position Not To Be Controverted, That The Earth ... Was And Ever Would Have Continued To Be, The Common Property Of The Human Race.

In Deism Our Reason And Our Belief Become Happily United. The Wonderful Structure Of The Universe, And Everything We Behold In The System Of The Creation, Prove To Us, Far Better Than Books Can Do, The Existence Of A God, And At The Same Time Proclaim His Attributes.

And As A Man, Who Is Attached To A Prostitute, Is Unfitted To Choose Or Judge Of A Wife, So Any Prepossession In Favour Of A Rotten Constitution Of Government Will Disable Us From Discerning A Good One.

The Evil That Has Resulted From The Error Of The Schools, In Teaching Natural Philosophy As An Accomplishment Only, Has Been That Of Generating In The Pupils A Species Of Atheism. Instead Of Looking Through The Works Of Creation To The Creator Himself, They Stop Short, And Employ The Knowledge They Acquire To Create Doubts Of His Existence. They Labour With Studied Ingenuity To Ascribe Every Thing They Behold To Innate Properties Of Matter, And Jump Over All The Rest By Saying, That Matter Is Eternal.

I Had Come To Realize The Importance Of The Nation, And Of Shared, Communal, Social Responsibility, To Be Held As Equally Important As Individual Concerns. The Elderly, The Widowed, Newly Married Couples, The Poor, The Unemployed, Disbanded Soldiers And Children, Who Would Be Required To Attend School, Must Be Provided For From State Funds. And All This Support Is Not The Nature Of Charity, But Of A Right.

The Nearer Any Disease Approaches To A Crisis, The Nearer It Is To A Cure. Danger And Deliverance Make Their Advances Together; And It Is Only In The Last Push That One Or The Other Takes The Lead.

It Is, I Believe, Impossible To Find In Any Story Upon Record So Many And Such Glaring Absurdities, Contradictions, And Falsehoods, As Are In The Books [the Gospels Of Matthew, Mark, Luke & John]. They Are More Numerous And Striking Than I Had Any Expectation Of Finding, When I Began This Examination.

Toleration Is Not The Opposite Of Intoleration, But It Is The Counterfeit Of It. Both Are Despotisms. The One Assumes To Itself The Right Of Withholding Liberty Of Conscience, And The Other Of Granting It. The One Is The Pope, Armed With Fire And Fagot, And The Other Is The Pope Selling Or Granting Indulgences.

People In General Know Not What Wickedness There Is In This Pretended Word Of God. Brought Up In Habits Of Superstition, They Take It For Granted That The Bible Is True, And That It Is Good; They Permit Themselves Not To Doubt Of It, And They Carry The Ideas They Form Of The Benevolence Of The Almighty To The Book Which They Have Been Taught To Believe Was Written By His Authority. Good Heavens! It Is Quite Another Thing; It Is A Book Of Lies, Wickedness, And Blasphemy.

Ignorance Is Of A Peculiar Nature; Once Dispelled, It Is Impossible To Reestablish It. It Is Not Originally A Thing Of Itself, But Is Only The Absence Of Knowledge; And Though Man May Be Kept Ignorant, He Cannot Be Made Ignorant.

I Would Give Worlds, If I Had Them, If The Age Of Reason Had Never Been Published. O Lord, Help! Stay With Me! It Is Hell To Be Left Alone.

The Bible Is A Book That Has Been Read More And Examined Less Than Any Book That Ever Existed.

There Are Two Distinct Classes Of Men - Those Who Pay Taxes And Those Who Receive And Live Upon Taxes.

Could The Peaceable Principle Of The Quakers Be Universally Established, Arms And The Art Of War Would Be Wholly Extirpated: But We Live Not In A World Of Angels...i Am Thus Far A Quaker, That I Would Gladly Agree With All The World To Lay Aside The Use Of Arms, And Settle Matters By Negotiation: But Unless The Whole Will, The Matter Ends, And I Take Up My Musket And Thank Heaven He Has Put It In My Power.

I Believe In One God, And No More; And I Hope For Happiness Beyond This Life.

Founding Fathers Atheist

The Aristocracy Are Not The Farmers Who Work The Land, And Raise The Produce, But Are The Mere Consumers Of The Rent; And When Compared With The Active World, Are The Drones, A Seraglio Of Males, Who Neither Collect The Honey Nor Form The Hive, But Exist Only For Lazy Enjoyment.

A Long Habit Of Not Thinking A Thing Wrong Gives It A Superficial Appearance Of Being Right.

But There Is Another And Greater Distinction For Which No Truly Natural Or Religious Reason Can Be Assigned, And That Is The Distinction Of Men Into Kings And Subjects. Male And Female Are The Distinctions Of Nature, Good And Bad The Distinctions Of Heaven; But How A Race Of Men Came Into The World So Exalted Above The Rest, And Distinguished Like Some New Species, Is Worth Inquiring Into, And Whether They Are The Means Of Happiness Or Of Misery To Mankind.

Reason And Ignorance, The Opposites Of Each Other, Influence The Great Bulk Of Mankind. If Either Of These Can Be Rendered Sufficiently Extensive In A Country, The Machinery Of Government Goes Easily On. Reason Obeys Itself; And Ignorance Submits To Whatever Is Dictated To It.

It Is With A Pious Fraud As With A Bad Action; It Begets A Calamitous Necessity Of Going On.

Beware The Greedy Hand Of Government Thrusting Itself Into Every Corner And Crevice Of Industry.

A Constitution Is Not The Act Of A Government, But Of A People Constituting A Government, And A Government Without A Constitution Is A Power Without Right.

Arms, Like Laws, Discourage And Keep The Invader And Plunderer In Awe And Preserve Order.

There Now Remain Only A Few Books, Which They Call Books Of The Lesser Prophets; And As I Have Already Shown That The Greater Are Impostors, It Would Be Cowardice To Disturb The Repose Of The Little Ones. Let Them Sleep, Then, In The Arms Of Their Nurses, The Priests, And Both Be Forgotten Together.

The More We Bestow The Richer We Become.

All This [paul's Writing] Is Nothing Better Than The Jargon Of A Conjurer Who Picks Up Phrases He Does Not Understand To Confound The Credulous People Who Come To Have Their Fortune Told. Age Of Reason

The Cause Of America Is In Great Measure The Cause Of All Mankind.

The Study Of Theology, As It Stands In Christian Churches, Is The Study Of Nothing; It Is Founded On Nothing; It Rests On No Principles; It Proceeds By No Authorities; It Has No Data; It Can Demonstrate Nothing; And It Admits Of No Conclusion.

The Burden Of The National Debt Consists Not In Its Being So Many Millions, Or So Many Hundred Millions, But In The Quantity Of Taxes Collected Every Year To Pay The Interest. If This Quantity Continue The Same, The Burden Of The National Debt Is The Same To All Intents And Purposes, Be The Capital More Or Less.

Of All The Tyrannies That Effect Mankind, Tyranny In Religion Is The Worst; Every Other Species Of Tyranny Is Limited To The World We Live In; But This Attempts To Stride Beyond The Grave, And Seeks To Pursue Us Into Eternity.

The Story Of Jesus Christ Appearing After He Was Dead Is The Story Of An Apparition, Such As Timid Imaginations Can Always Create In Vision, And Credulity Believe. Stories Of This Kind Had Been Told Of The Assassination Of Julius Caesar.

It Matters Not Where You Live, Or What Rank Of Life You Hold, The Evil Or The Blessing Will Reach You All.

The Christian Religion And Masonry Have One And The Same Common Origin: Both Are Derived From The Worship Of The Sun. The Difference Between Their Origin Is, That The Christian Religion Is A Parody On The Worship Of The Sun, In Which They Put A Man Whom They Call Christ, In The Place Of The Sun, And Pay Him The Same Adoration Which Was Originally Paid To The Sun.

Government, Like Dress, Is The Badge Of Lost Innocence.

Never, I Say, Had A Country So Many Openings To Happiness As This.... Her Cause Was Good. Her Principles Just And Liberal. Her Temper Serene And Firm.... The Remembrance Then Of What Is Past, If It Operates Rightly Must Inspire Her With The Most Laudable Of An Ambition, That Of Adding To The Fair Fame She Began With. The World Has Seen Her Great Adversity.... Let Then, The World See That She Can Bear Prosperity; And That Her Honest Virtue In Time Of Peace Is Equal To The Bravest Virtue In Time Of War.

To Bring The Matter To One Point, Is The Power Who Is Jealous Of Our Prosperity, A Proper Power To Govern Us? Whoever Says, No, To This Question, Is An Independent, For Independency Means No More Than This, Whether We Shall Make Our Own Law, Or, Whether The King, The Greatest Enemy Which This Continent Hath, Or Can Have, Shall Tell Us There Shall Be No Laws But Such As I Like.

That Which Is Now Called Natural Philosophy, Embracing The Whole Circle Of Science, Of Which Astronomy Occupies The Chief Place, Is The Study Of The Works Of God, And Of The Power And Wisdom Of God In His Works, And Is The True Theology.

Mingling Religion With Politics May Be Disavowed And Reprobated By Every Inhabitant Of America.

I Die Content, I Die For The Liberty Of My Country.

... In Free Countries The Law Ought To Be King; And There Ought To Be No Other.

Therefore We Say That A Lying Spirit Has Been In The Mouth Of The Writers Of The Books Of The Bible.

[a]ll Churches, Whether Jewish, Christian Or Muslim, Are Simply Human Inventions. They Use Fear To Enslave Us. They Are A Monopoly For Power And Profit.

And When We View A Flag, Which To The Eye Is Beautiful, And To Contemplate Its Rise And Origin Inspires A Sensation Of Sublime Delight, Our National Honor Must Unite With Our Interests To Prevent Injury To The One, Or Insult To The Other.

As To The Christian System Of Faith, It Appears To Me As A Species Of Atheism — A Sort Of Religious Denial Of God. It Professes To Believe In A Man Rather Than In God. It Is A Compound Made Up Chiefly Of Manism With But Little Deism, And Is As Near To Atheism As Twilight Is To Darkness. It Introduces Between Man And His Maker An Opaque Body, Which It Calls A Redeemer, As The Moon Introduces Her Opaque Self Between The Earth And The Sun, And It Produces By This Means A Religious, Or An Irreligious, Eclipse Of Light. It Has Put The Whole Orbit Of Reason Into Shade.

The Accumulation Of Great Wealth Is, In Many Instances, The Effect Of Paying Too Little For The Labor That Produced It, The Consequence Of Which Is That The Working People Perish In Old Age And The Employer Abounds In Affluence.

There Is Something In Meanness Which Excites A Species Of Resentment That Never Subsides, And Something In Cruelty Which Stirs Up The Heart To The Highest Agony Of Human Hatred.

Accustom A People To Believe That Priests, Or Any Other Class Of Men Can Forgive Sins And You Will Have Sins In Abundance.

The Trade Of Governing Has Always Been Monopolized By The Most Ignorant And The Most Rascally Individuals Of Mankind.

Man Must Go Back To Nature For Information.

No Country Can Be Called Free Which Is Governed By An Absolute Power; And It Matters Not Whether It Be An Absolute Royal Power Or An Absolute Legislative Power, As The Consequences Will Be The Same To The People.

Belief In A Cruel God Makes A Cruel Man.

It Is The Fable Of Jesus Christ, As Told In The New Testament, And The Wild And Visionary Doctrine Raised Thereon, Against Which I Contend. The Story, Taking It As It Is Told, Is Blasphemously Obscene.

The Birthday Of A New World Is At Hand.

A Constitution, Therefore, Is To A Government What The Laws Made Afterwards By That Government Are To A Court Of Judicature. The Court Of Judicature Does Not Make The Laws, Neither Can It Alter Them; It Only Acts In Conformity To The Laws Made: And The Government Is In Like Manner Governed By The Constitution.

Everything Wonderful In Appearance Has Been Ascribed To Angels, To Devils, Or To Saints. Everything Ancient Has Some Legendary Tale Annexed To It. The Common Operations Of Nature Have Not Escaped Their Practice Of Corrupting Everything.

Whatever Is My Right As A Man Is Also The Right Of Another; And It Becomes My Duty To Guarantee As Well As To Possess.

The New Testament Rests Itself For Credulity And Testimony On What Are Called Prophecies In The Old Testament, Of The Person Called Jesus Christ; And If There Are No Such Things As Prophecies Of Any Such Person In The Old Testament, The New Testament.

And To Read The Bible Without Horror, We Must Undo Everything That Is Tender, Sympathizing And Benevolent In The Heart Of Man.

What Is It The Bible Teaches Us? - Raping, Cruelty, And Murder. What Is It The New Testament Teaches Us? - To Believe That The Almighty Committed Debauchery With A Woman Engaged To Be Married, And The Belief Of This Debauchery Is Called Faith.

We Do Not Admit The Authority Of The Church With Respect To Its Pretended Infallibility, Its Manufactured Miracles, Its Setting Itself Up To Forgive Sins. It Was By Propagating That Belief And Supporting It With Fire That She Kept Up Her Temporal Power.

One Of The Evils Of Paper Money Is That It Turns The Whole Country Into Stock Jobbers. The Precariousness Of Its Value And The Uncertainty Of Its Fate Continually Operate, Night And Day, To Produce This Destructive Effect. Having No Real Value In Itself It Depends For Support Upon Accident, Caprice, And Party; And As It Is The Interest Of Some To Depreciate And Of Others To Raise Its Value, There Is A Continual Invention Going On That Destroys The Morals Of The Country.

The Bill Of Rights Should Contain The General Principles Of Natural And Civil Liberty. It Should Be To A Community What The Eternal Laws And Obligations Of Morality Are To The Conscience. It Should Be Unalterable By Any Human Power.

Titles Are But Nicknames, And Every Nickname Is A Title.

'tis The Business Of Little Minds To Shrink; But He Whose Heart Is Firm, And Whose Conscience Approves His Conduct, Will Pursue His Principles Unto Death.

He, Who Survives His Reputation, Lives Out Of Despite Himself, Like A Man Listening To His Own Reproach.

All Of Us Might Wish At Times That We Lived In A More Tranquil World....(yet) Our Times Are Challenging And Filled With Opportunity.

But Though Every Created Thing Is, In This Sense, A Mystery, The Word Mystery Cannot Be Applied To Moral Truth, Any More Than Obscurity Can Be Applied To Light. ... Mystery Is The Antagonist Of Truth. It Is A Fog Of Human Invention, That Obscures Truth, And Represents It In Distortion. Truth Never Envelops Itself In Mystery, And The Mystery In Which It Is At Any Time Enveloped Is The Work Of Its Antagonist, And Never Of Itself.

...thomas Did Not Believe The Resurrection [john 20:25], And, As They Say, Would Not Believe Without Having Ocular And Manual Demonstration Himself. So Neither Will I, And The Reason Is Equally As Good For Me, And For Every Other Person, As For Thomas.

Cultivation Is At Least One Of The Greatest Natural Improvements Ever Made By Human Invention. It Has Given To Created Earth A Tenfold Value. But The Landed Monopoly That Began With It Has Produced The Greatest Evil. It Has Dispossessed More Than Half The Inhabitants Of Every Nation Of Their Natural Inheritance, Without Providing For Them, As Ought To Have Been Done, An Indemnification For That Loss, And Has Thereby Created A Species Of Poverty And Wretchedness That Did Not Exist Before.

It Is Unpleasant To See Character Throw Itself Away.

I Fear Not, I See Not Reason For Fear. In The End We Will Be The Victors. For Though At Times The Flame Of Liberty May Cease To Shine, The Ember Will Never Expire.

We Feel Something Like Respect For Consistency Even In Error. We Lament The Virtue That Is Debauched Into A Vice; But The Vice That Affects A Virtue Becomes The More Detestable.

It Is Always To Be Taken For Granted, That Those Who Oppose An Equality Of Rights Never Mean The Exclusion Should Take Place On Themselves.

The Artificial Noble Shrinks Into A Dwarf Before The Noble Of Nature; And In The Few Instances (for There Are Some In All Countries) In Whom Nature, As By A Miracle, Has Survived In Aristocracy, Those Men Despise It.

The Slavery Of Fear Had Made Men Afraid To Think.

War Is The Gambling Table Of Governments, And Citizens The Dupes Of The Game.

Those Who Expect To Reap The Blessings Of Freedom Must, Like Men, Undergo The Fatigue Of Supporting It.

Freedom Had Been Hunted Round The Globe; Reason Was Considered As Rebellion; And The Slavery Of Fear Had Made Men Afraid To Think. But Such Is The Irresistible Nature Of Truth, That All It Asks, And All It Wants, Is The Liberty Of Appearing.

Those Who Expect To Reap The Blessing Of Freedom Must Undertake To Support It.

There Is Something In Corruption Which, Like A Jaundiced Eye, Transfers The Color Of Itself To The Object It Looks Upon, And Sees Everything Stained And Impure.

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