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The Intellectual Part Of Religion Is A Private Affair Between Every Man And His Maker, And In Which No Third Party Has Any Right To Interfere. The Practical Part Consists In Our Doing Good To Each Other. But Since Religion Has Been Made Into A Trade, The Practical Part Has Been Made To Consist Of Ceremonies Performed By Men Called Priests ... By Devices Of This Kind True Religion Has Been Banished, And Such Means Have Been Found Out To Extract Money, Even From The Pockets Of The Poor, Instead Of Contributing To Their Relief.

-Thomas Paine

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The Intellectual Part Of

Thomas Paine

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The Intellectual Part Of Religion Is A Private Affair Between Every Man And His Maker, And In Which No Third Party Has Any Right To Interfere. The Practical Part Consists In Our Doing Good To Each Other. But Since Religion Has Been Made Into A Trade, The Practical Part Has Been Made To Consist Of Ceremonies Performed By Men Called Priests ... By Devices Of This Kind True Religion Has Been Banished, And Such Means Have Been Found Out To Extract Money, Even From The Pockets Of The Poor, Instead Of Contributing To Their Relief.

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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.

There Is A Happiness In Deism, When Rightly Understood, That Is Not To Be Found Inany Other System Of Religion. All Other Systems Have Something In Them That Either Shock Our Reason, Or Are Repugnant To It, And Man, If He Thinks At All, Must Stifle His Reason In Order To Force Himself To Believe Them.

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

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 More Men Have To Lose, The Less Willing Are They To Venture.

... A Thirst For Power Is The Natural Disease Of Monarchy.

Thirst For Power

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

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

A Body Of Men Holding Themselves Accountable To Nobody Ought Not To Be Trusted By Anybody.

It Is The Duty Of Every Man, As Far As His Ability Extends, To Detect And Expose Delusion And Error.

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

An Avidity To Punish Is Always Dangerous To Liberty. It Leads Men To Stretch, To Misinterpret, And To Misapply Even The Best Of Laws.

The Christian Church Has Set Up A Religion Of Pomp And Revenue In Pretended Imitation Of A Person (jesus) Who Lived A Life Of Poverty.

...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.

It Is Not A God, Just And Good, But A Devil, Under The Name Of God, That The Bible Describes.

Government, Even In Its Best State, Is But A Necessary Evil; In Its Worst State, An Intolerable One.

...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.

I Draw My Idea Of The Form Of Government From A Principle In Nature, Which No Art Can Overturn, Viz. That The More Simple Any Thing Is, The Less Liable It Is To Be Disordered; And The Easier Repaired When Disordered.

Evils, Like Poisons, Have Their Uses, And There Are Diseases Which No Other Remedy Can Reach.

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.

Thus Commerce, Though In Itself A Moral Nullity, Has Had A Considerable Influence In Tempering The Human Mind....he Trades With The Same Countries ...(that He) Would Have Gone To War With.

The Slavery Of Fear Had Made Men Afraid To Think.

All Men Can Understand What Representation Is; And That It Must Necessarily Include A Variety Of Knowledge And Talents.

A Constitution Defines And Limits The Powers Of The Government It Creates. It Therefore Follows, As A Natural And Also A Logical Result, That The Governmental Exercise Of Any Power Not Authorized By The Constitution Is An Assumed Power, And Therefore Illegal.

Priests And Conjurors Are Of The Same Trade.

It Is Never To Be Expected In A Revolution That Every Man Is To Change His Opinion At The Same Moment. There Never Yet Was Any Truth Or Any Principle So Irresistibly Obvious That All Men Believed It At Once. Time And Reason Must Cooperate With Each Other To The Final Establishment Of Any Principle; And Therefore Those Who May Happen To Be First Convinced Have Not A Right To Persecute Others, On Whom Conviction Operates More Slowly. The Moral Principle Of Revolutions Is To Instruct, Not To Destroy.

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

Man Cannot Make, Or Invent, Or Contrive Principles; He Can Only Discover Them; And He Ought To Look Through The Discovery To The Author.

Now Is The Seedtime Of Continental Union, Faith And Honor. The Least Fracture Now, Will Be Like A Name Engraved With The Point Of A Pin On The Tender Rind Of A Young Oak; The Wound Would Enlarge With The Tree, And Posterity Read In It Full Grown Characters.

Commerce Is No Other Than The Traffic Of Two Individuals, Multiplied On A Scale Of Number; And, By The Same Rule That Nature Intended The Intercourse Of Two, She Intended That Of All!

What Is It The Bible Teaches Us? -- Rapine, Cruelty, And Murder.

Founding Fathers Religion

One Of The Strongest Natural Proofs Of The Folly Of Hereditary Right In Kings, Is, That Nature Disapproves It, Otherwise, She Would Not So Frequently Turn It Into Ridicule By Giving Mankind An Ass For A Lion.

When Extraordinary Power And Extraordinary Pay Are Allotted To Any Individual In A Government, He Becomes The Center, Round Which Every Kind Of Corruption Generates And Forms.

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

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 Appears To General Observation, That Revolutions Create Genius And Talents; But Those Events Do No More Than Bring Them Forward. There Is Existing In Man, A Mass Of Sense Lying In A Dormant State, And Which, Unless Something Excites It To Action, Will Descend With Him, In That Condition, To The Grave. As It Is To The Advantage Of Society That The Whole Of Its Faculties Should Be Employed, The Construction Of Government Ought To Be Such As To Bring Forward, By A Quiet And Regular Operation, All That Extent Of Capacity Which Never Fails To Appear In Revolutions.

Wisdom Is Not The Purchase Of A Day, And It Is No Wonder That We Should Err At The First Setting Off.

Men Who Are Sincere In Defending Their Freedom, Will Always Feel Concern At Every Circumstance Which Seems To Make Against Them; It Is The Natural And Honest Consequence Of All Affectionate Attachments, And The Want Of It Is A Vice. But The Dejection Lasts Only For A Moment; They Soon Rise Out Of It With Additional Vigor; The Glow Of Hope, Courage And Fortitude, Will, In A Little Time, Supply The Place Of Every Inferior Passion, And Kindle The Whole Heart Into Heroism.

The Stupid Texts Of The Bible - From Which, Be The Talents Of The Preacher What They May, Only Stupid Sermons Can Be Preached.

The Prejudice Of Unfounded Belief Often Degenerates Into The Prejudice Of Custom, And Becomes At Last Rank Hypocrisy. When Men, From Custom Or Fashion Or Any Worldly Motive, Profess Or Pretend To Believe What They Do Not Believe, Nor Can Give Any Reason For Believing, They Unship The Helm Of Their Morality, And Being No Longer Honest To Their Own Minds They Feel No Moral Difficulty In Being Unjust To Others.

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.

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.

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.

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.

The Greatest Characters The World Has Known, Have Rose On The Democratic Floor. Aristocracy Has Not Been Able To Keep A Proportionate Pace With Democracy.

My Country Is Wherever Liberty Lives.

Oppression Is Often The Consequence, But Seldom Or Never The Means Of Riches; And Tho' Avarice Will Preserve A Man From Being Necessitously Poor, It Generally Makes Him Too Timorous To Be Wealthy.

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

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

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.

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.

Action And Care Will In Time Wear Down The Strongest Frame, But Guilt And Melancholy Are Poisons Of Quick Dispatch.

The Guilt Of A Government Is The Crime Of A Whole Country.

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.

Christianity Is The Strangest Religion Ever Set Up, For It Committed A Murder Upon Jesus In Order To Redeem Mankind From The Sin Of Eating An Apple.

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.

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.

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

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.

The Declaration Which Says That God Visits The Sins Of The Fathers Upon The Children Is Contrary To Every Principle Of Moral Justice.

I Prefer Peace. But If Trouble Must Come, Let It Come In My Time, So That My Children Can Live In Peace.

All The Tales Of Miracles, With Which The Old And New Testament Are Filled, Are Fit Only For Impostors To Preach And Fools To Believe.

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.

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.

Before Anything Can Be Reasoned Upon To A Conclusion, Certain Facts, Principles, Or Data, To Reason From, Must Be Established, Admitted, Or Denied.

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

Titles Are Like A Magicians Wand Which Circumscribe Human Facility And Prevent Us From Living The Lives Of Man.

The Sublime And The Ridiculous Are Often So Nearly Related, That It Is Difficult To Class Them Separately. One Step Above The Sublime Makes The Ridiculous, And One Step Above The Ridiculous Makes The Sublime Again.

The Grecians And Romans Were Strongly Possessed Of The Spirit Of Liberty But Not The Principle, For At The Time They Were Determined Not To Be Slaves Themselves, They Employed Their Power To Enslave The Rest Of Mankind.

If Anything Had Or Could Have A Value Equal To Gold And Silver, It Would Require No Tender Law; And If It Had Not That Value It Ought Not To Have Such A Law; And, Therefore, All Tender Laws Are Tyrannical And Unjust And Calculated To Support Fraud And Oppression.

It Is Easy To See That When Republican Virtue Fails, Slavery Ensues.

Is It Not A Species Of Blasphemy To Call The New Testament Revealed Religion, When We See In It Such Contradictions And Absurdities.

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.

Lay Then The Axe To The Root, And Teach Governments Humanity. It Is Their Sanguinary Punishments Which Corrupt Mankind.

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

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.

If Any Generation Of Men Ever Possessed The Right Of Dictating The Mode By Which The World Should Be Governed For Ever, It Was The First Generation That Existed; And If That Generation Did It Not, No Succeeding Generation Can Show Any Authority For Doing It, Nor Can Set Any Up.

A Government Of Our Own Is Our Natural Right; And When A Man Seriously Reflects On The Precariousness Of Human Affairs, He Will Become Convinced, That It Is Infinitely Wiser And Safer, To Form A Constitution Of Our Own In A Cool Deliberate Manner, While We Have It In Our Power, Than To Trust Such An Interesting Event To Time And Chance.

The Intellectual Part Of Religion Is A Private Affair Between Every Man And His Maker, And In Which No Third Party Has Any Right To Interfere. The Practical Part Consists In Our Doing Good To Each Other. But Since Religion Has Been Made Into A Trade, The Practical Part Has Been Made To Consist Of Ceremonies Performed By Men Called Priests ... By Devices Of This Kind True Religion Has Been Banished, And Such Means Have Been Found Out To Extract Money, Even From The Pockets Of The Poor, Instead Of Contributing To Their Relief.

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 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.

He That Rebels Against Reason Is A Real Rebel, But He That In Defence Of Reason Rebels Against Tyranny Has A Better Title To Defender Of The Faith, Than George The Third.

It Is Not A Field Of A Few Acres Of Ground, But A Cause, That We Are Defending, And Whether We Defeat The Enemy In One Battle, Or By Degrees, The Consequences Will Be The Same.

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

Taxes Were Not Raised To Carry On Wars, But That Wars Were Raised To Carry On Taxes.

The Harder The Conflict, The More Glorious The Triumph. I Love The Man That Can Smile In Trouble, That Can Gather Strength From Distress And Grow.

I Consider The War Of America Against Britain As The Country's War, The Public's War, Or The War Of The People In Their Own Behalf, For The Security Of Their Natural Rights, And The Protection Of Their Own Property.

It Has Been The Error Of The Schools To Teach Astronomy, And All The Other Sciences, And Subjects Of Natural Philosophy, As Accomplishments Only; Whereas They Should Be Taught Theologically, Or With Reference To The Being Who Is The Author Of Them: For All The Principles Of Science Are Of Divine Origin. Man Cannot Make, Or Invent, Or Contrive Principles: He Can Only Discover Them; And He Ought To Look Through The Discovery To The Author.

Let It Be Told To The Future World, That In The Depth Of Winter, When Nothing But Hope And Virtue Could Survive, The City And The Country, Alarmed At One Common Danger, Came Forth To Meet And To Repulse It.

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.

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?

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

The Obscene And Vulgar Stories In The Bible Are As Repugnant To Our Ideas Of The Purity Of A Divine Being, As The Horrid Cruelties And Murders It Ascribes To Him Are Repugnant To Our Ideas Of His Justice.

Titles Are But Nicknames, And Every Nickname Is A Title. The Thing Is Perfectly Harmless In Itself, But It Marks A Sort Of Foppery In The Human Character, Which Degrades It.

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.

Nothing But Heaven Is Impregnable To Vice.

His [jesus'] Historians, Having Brought Him Into The World In A Supernatural Manner, Were Obliged To Take Him Out Again In The Same Manner, Or The First Part Of The Story Must Have Fallen To The Ground.

A Bad Cause Will Ever Be Supported By Bad Means And Bad Men.

The Sun Never Shined On A Cause Of Greater Worth.

What We Obtain Too Cheap, We Esteem Too Lightly; It Is Dearness Only That Gives Everything Its Value.

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.

The Most Detestable Wickedness, The Most Horrid Cruelties, And The Greatest Miseries, That Have Afflicted The Human Race Have Had Their Origin In This Thing Called Revelation, Or Revealed Religion.

Prejudice, Like The Spider, Makes Everywhere Its Home. It Has Neither Taste Nor Choice Of Place, And All That It Requires Is Room. If The One Prepares Her Food By Poisoning It To Her Palate And Her Use, The Other Does The Same. Prejudice May Be Denominated The Spider Of The Mind.

I Wish Most Anxiously To See My Much Loved America - It Is The Country From Whence All Reformations Must Originally Spring - I Despair Of Seeing An Abolition Of The Infernal Trafic In Negroes - We Must Push That Matter Further On Your Side The Water - I Wish That A Few Well Instructed Negroes Could Be Sent Among Their Brethren In Bondage, For Until They Are Enabled To Take Their Own Part Nothing Will Be Done.

These Are The Times That Try Men's Souls. The Summer Soldier And The Sunshine Patriot Will, In This Crisis, Shrink From The Service Of His Country; But He That Stands It Now, Deserves The Love And Thanks Of Man And Woman.

These Are The Days That Try Man's Heart.

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.

The Story Of The Redemption Will Not Stand Examination. That Man Should Redeem Himself From The Sin Of Eating An Apple By Committing A Murder On Jesus Christ, Is The Strangest System Of Religion Ever Set Up.

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 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.

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 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.

Could The Straggling Thoughts Of Individuals Be Collected, They Would Frequently Form Materials For Wise And Able Men To Improve Into Useful Matter.

When It Shall Be Said In Any Country In The World My Poor Are Happy; Neither Ignorance Nor Distress Is To Be Found Among Them; My Jails Are Empty Of Prisoners, My Streets Of Beggars; The Aged Are Not In Want; The Taxes Are Not Oppressive; The Rational World Is My Friend, Because I Am A Friend Of Its Happiness: When These Things Can Be Said, There May That Country Boast Its Constitution And Its Government

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

Heaven Knows How To Put A Proper Price Upon Its Goods. It Would Be Strange Indeed If So Celestial An Article As Freedom Should Not Be Highly Rated. Britain, With An Army To Enforce Her Tyranny, Has Declared That She Has A Right (not Only To Tax) But "to Bind Us In All Cases Whatsoever," And If Being Bound In That Manner, Is Not Slavery, Then Is There Not Such A Thing As Slavery Upon Earth. Even The Expression Is Impious, For So Unlimited A Power Can Belong Only To God.

A Single Legislature, On Account Of The Superabundance Of Its Power, And The Uncontrolled Rabidity Of Its Execution, Becomes As Dangerous To The Principles Of Liberty As That Of A Despotic Monarch.

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.

Government Is A Necessary Evil

It Is A Fraud Of The Christian System To Call The Sciences Human Invention; It Is Only The Application Of Them That Is Human.

Everything That Is Right Or Reasonable Pleads For Separation. The Blood Of The Slain, The Weeping Voice Of Nature Cries, 'tis Time To Part.

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.

A Government Of Our Own Is Our Natural Right

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.

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

From Such Beginnings Of Governments, What Could Be Expected, But A Continual System Of War And Extortion?

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

The Allwise Creator Hath Been Dishonored By Being Made The Author Of Fable And The Human Mind Degraded By Believing It.

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.

It Is Important That We Should Never Lose Sight Of This Distinction. We Must Not Confuse The Peoples With Their Governments.

But Such Is The Irresistable Nature Of Truth, That All It Asks, And All It Wants Is The Liberty Of Appearing.

There Are A Set Of Men Who Go About Making Purchases Upon Credit, And Buying Estates They Have Not Wherewithal To Pay For; And Having Done This, Their Next Step Is To Fill The Newspapers With Paragraphs Of The Scarcity Of Money And The Necessity Of A Paper Emission, Then To Have A Legal Tender Under The Pretense Of Supporting Its Credit, And When Out, To Depreciate It As Fast As They Can, Get A Deal Of It For A Little Price, And Cheat Their Creditors; And This Is The Concise History Of Paper Money Schemes.

Suspicion Is The Companion Of Mean Souls, And The Bane Of All Good Society.

We Still Find The Greedy Hand Of Government Thrusting Itself Into Every Corner And Crevice Of Industry And Grasping At The Spoil Of The Multitude. Invention Is Continually Exercised To Furnish New Pretenses For Revenue And Taxation. It Watches Prosperity As Its Prey And Permits None To Escape Without A Tribute.

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.

The Story Of The Whale Swallowing Jonah, Though A Whale Is Large Enough To Do It, Borders Greatly On The Marvelous; But It Would Have Approached Nearer To The Idea Of A Miracle If Jonah Had Swallowed The Whale.

But Where, Says Some, Is The King Of America? I'll Tell You. Friend, He Reigns Above, And Doth Not Make Havoc Of Mankind Like The Royal Brute Of Britain.

...for Though The Flame Of Liberty May Sometimes Cease To Shine, The Coal Can Never Expire.

In Reviewing The History Of The English Government, Its Wars And Its Taxes, A Bystander, Not Blinded By Prejudice Nor Warped By Interest, Would Declare That Taxes Were Not Raised To Carry On Wars, But That Wars Were Raised To Carry On Taxes.

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.

The Christian System Of Religion Is An Outrage On Common Sense.

But There Are Times When Men Have Serious Thoughts, And It Is At Such Times, When They Begin To Think, That They Begin To Doubt The Truth Of The Christian Religion; And Well They May, For It Is Too Fanciful And Too Full Of Conjecture, Inconsistency, Improbability And Irrationality, To Afford Consolation To The Thoughtful Man. His Reason Revolts Against His Creed. He Sees That None Of Its Articles Are Proved, Or Can Be Proved.

The Almighty Lecturer, By Displaying The Principles Of Science In The Structure Of The Universe, Has Invited Man To Study And To Imitation. It Is As If He Has Said To The Inhabitants Of This Globe That We Call Ours, "i Have Made An Earth For Man To Dwell Upon, And I Have Rendered The Starry Heavens Visible, To Teach Him Science And The Arts. He Can Now Provide For His Own Comfort, And Learn From My Munificence To All To Be Kind To Each Other.

It Is Necessary To The Happiness Of Man That He Be Mentally Faithful To Himself.

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.

Money, When Considered As The Fruit Of Many Years' Industry, As The Reward Of Labor, Sweat And Toil, As The Widow's Dowry And Children's Portion, And As The Means Of Procuring The Necessaries And Alleviating The Afflictions Of Life, And Making Old Age A Scene Of Rest, Has Something In It Sacred That Is Not To Be Sported With, Or Trusted To The Airy Bubble Of Paper Currency.

The Word Of God Is The Creation We Behold: And It Is In This Word, Which No Human Invention Can Counterfeit Or Alter, That God Speaketh Universally To Man.

Tears May Soothe The Wounds They Cannot Heal.

It May Perhaps Be Said That It Signifies Nothing To A Man What Is Done To Him After He Is Dead; But It Signifies Much To The Living; It Either Tortures Their Feelings Or Hardens Their Hearts.

I Do Not Believe That Any Two Men, On What Are Called Doctrinal Points, Think Alike Who Think At All. It Is Only Those Who Have Not Thought That Appear To Agree.

Religion Is A History Of Wickedness That Has Served To Corrupt And Brutalize Humankind; And, For My Part, I Sincerely Detest It As I Detest Everything That Is Cruel.

The American Constitutions Were To Liberty, What A Grammar Is To Language: They Define Its Parts Of Speech, And Practically Construct Them Into Syntax

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.

A Man May Write Himself Out Of Reputation When Nobody Else Can Do It.

If I Do Not Believe As You Believe, It Proves That You Do Not Believe As I Believe, And That Is All That It Proves.

From The Errors Of Other Nations, Let Us Learn Wisdom.

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

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

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

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.

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.

The Case, However, Is, That The Bible Will Not Bear Examination In Any Part Of It, Which It Would Do If It Was The Word Of God. Those Who Most Believe It Are Those Who Know Least About It, And Priests Always Take Care To Keep The Inconsistent And Contradictory Parts Out Of Sight.

It Is Far Better That We Admitted A Thousand Devils To Roam At Large Than That We Permitted One Such Imposter And Monster As Moses, Joshua, Samuel, And The Bible Prophets, To Come With The Pretended Word Of God And Have Credit Among Us.

Those Who Knew Benjamin Franklin Will Recollect That His Mind Was Forever Young, His Temper Ever Serene; Science, That Never Grows Gray, Was Always His Mistress. He Was Never Without An Object, For When We Cease To Have An Object, We Become Like An Invalid In A Hospital Waiting For Death.

Government, Like Dress, Is The Badge Of Lost Innocence; The Palaces Of Kings Are Built On The Ruins Of The Bowers Of Paradise.

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 Harder The Conflict, The More Glorious The Triumph. What We Obtain Too Cheap, We Esteem Too Lightly; It Is Dearness Only That Gives Everything Its Value. I Love The Man That Can Smile In Trouble, That Can Gather Strength From Distress And Grow Brave By Reflection. '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.

Government Ought To Be As Much Open To Improvement As Anything Which Appertains To Man, Instead Of Which It Has Been Monopolized From Age To Age, By The Most Ignorant And Vicious Of The Human Race. Need We Any Other Proof Of Their Wretched Management, Than The Excess Of Debts And Taxes With Which Every Nation Groans, And The Quarrels Into Which They Have Precipitated The World?"

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.

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.

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.

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.

If The Present Generation, Or Any Other, Are Disposed To Be Slaves, It Does Not Lessen The Right Of The Succeeding Generation To Be Free: Wrongs Cannot Have A Legal Descent.

It Has Been The Scheme Of The Christian Church, And Of All The Other Invented Systems Of Religion, To Hold Man In Ignorance Of The Creator, As It Is Of Government To Hold Man In Ignorance Of His Rights. The Systems Of The One Are As False As Those Of The Other, And Are Calculated For Mutual Support.

...the Bible Is Such A Book Of Lies And Contradictions There Is No Knowing Which Part To Believe Or Whether Any.

Small Islands, Not Capable Of Protecting Themselves, Are The Proper Objects For Kingdoms To Take Under Their Care; But There Is Something Absurd, In Supposing A Continent To Be Perpetually Governed By An Island.

As Priestcraft Was Always The Enemy Of Knowledge, Because Priestcraft Supports Itself By Keeping People In Delusion And Ignorance, It Was Consistent With Its Policy To Make The Acquisition Of Knowledge A Real Sin.

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

Commerce Diminishes The Spirit, Both Of Patriotism And Military Defence.

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

The Instant Formal Government Is Abolished, Society Begins To Act. A General Association Takes Place, And Common Interest Produces Common Security.

Government Is Best Which Governs Least

Democracies Have

A Constitution Is Not The Act Of A Government, But Of A People Constituting A Government; And Government Without A Constitution Is Power Without A Right. All Power Exercised Over A Nation, Must Have Some Beginning. It Must Be Either Delegated, Or Assumed. There Are Not Other Sources. All Delegated Power Is Trust, And All Assumed Power Is Usurpation. Time Does Not Alter The Nature And Quality Of Either.

I Die In Perfect Composure And Resignation To The Will Of My Creator, God.

To Take Away (voting) Is To Reduce A Man To Slavery.

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.

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.

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.

Every Age And Generation Must Be As Free To Act For Itself.

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.

It Requires But A Very Small Glance Of Thought To Perceive, That Although Laws Made In One Generation Often Continue In Force Through Succeeding Generations, Yet That They Continue To Derive Their Force From The Consent Of The Living. A Law Not Repealed Continues In Force, Not Because It Cannot Be Repealed, But Because It Is Not Repealed; And The Non Repealing Passes For Consent.

There Are Two Distinct Classes Of What Are Called Thoughts: Those That We Produce In Ourselves By Reflection And The Act Of Thinking And Those That Bolt Into The Mind Of Their Own Accord.

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

The Art Of Publicity Is A Black Art; But It Has Come To Stay, And Every Year Adds To Its Potency.

It Is Unpleasant To See Character Throw Itself Away.

A Nation Under A Well Regulated Government, Should Permit None To Remain Uninstructed. It Is Monarchical And Aristocratical Government Only That Requires Ignorance For Its Support.

He Who Is The Author Of A War Lets Loose The Whole Contagion Of Hell And Opens A Vein That Bleeds A Nation To Death.

It Is The Object Only Of War That Makes It Honorable.

Aristocracy Has A Tendency To Degenerate The Human Species.

There Never Did, There Never Will, And There Never Can Exist A Parliament, Or Any Description Of Men, Or Any Generation Of Men, In Any Country, Possessed Of The Right Or The Power Of Binding And Controlling Posterity To The 'end Of Time,' Or Of Commanding For Ever How The World Shall Be Governed, Or Who Shall Govern It. Every Age And Generation Must Be As Free To Act For Itself, In All Cases, As The Ages And Generations Which Preceded It.

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