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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.

-Thomas Paine

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The Story Of Jesus

Thomas Paine

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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.

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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.

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.

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.

Ye That Dare Oppose, Not Only Tyranny, But The Tyrant, Stand Forth!

A World Of Little Cares Is Continually Arising, Which Busy Or Affluent Life Knows Nothing Of, To Open The First Door To Distress. Hunger Is Not Among The Postponable Wants; And A Day, Even A Few Hours, In Such A Condition Is Often The Crisis Of A Life Of Ruin.

The End Of All Political Associations Is The Preservation Of The Natural And Imprescriptible Rights Of Man; And These Rights Are Liberty, Property, Security, And Resistance Of Oppression.

Calumny Is A Vice Of Curious Constitution; Trying To Kill It Keeps It Alive; Leave It To Itself And It Will Die A Natural Death.

Mystery Is The Antagonist Of Truth. It Is A Fog Of Human Invention, That Obscures Truth, And Represents It In Distortion.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Revelation Is Necessarily Limited To The First Communication- After That It Is Only An Account Of Something Which That Person Says Was A Revelation Made To Him; And Though He May Find Himself Obliged To Believe It, It Can Not Be Incumbent On Me To Believe It In The Same Manner; For It Was Not A Revelation Made To Me, And I Have Only His Word For It That It Was Made To Him.

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

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.

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.

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.

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 First Part Of 'rights Of Man' I Have Endeavoured To Show...that There Does Not Exist A Right To Establish Hereditary Government...because Hereditary Government Always Means A Government Yet To Come, And The Case Always Is, That The People Who Are To Live Afterwards, Have Always The Same Right To Choose A Government For Themselves, As The People Had Who Have Lived Before Them.

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.

The Nt, Compared With The Old, Is Like A Farce Of One Act.

Virtues Are Acquired Through Endeavor, Which Rests Wholly Upon Yourself. So, To Praise Others For Their Virtues Can But Encourage One's Own Efforts.

No Nation Ought To Be Without A Debt. A National Debt Is A National Bond; And When It Bears No Interest, Is In No Case A Grievance.

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

These Proceedings May At First Seem Strange And Difficult, But Like All Other Steps Which We Have Already Passed Over, Will In A Little Time Become Familiar And Agreeable: And Until An Independence Is Declared, The Continent Will Feel Itself Like A Man Who Continues Putting Off Some Unpleasant Business From Day To Day, Yet Knows It Must Be Done, Hates To Set About It, Wishes It Over, And Is Continually Haunted With The Thoughts Of Its Necessity.

Prophesying Is Lying Professionally.

It Is From Our Enemies That We Often Gain Excellent Maxims, And Are Frequently Surprised Into Reason By Their Mistakes.

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

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.

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.

Compassion, The Fairest Associate Of The Heart.

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.

It Is A Faculty Of The Human Mind To Become What It Contemplates, And To Act In Unison With Its Object.

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

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.

To Be Nobly Wrong Is More Manly Than To Be Meanly Right.

Those Words, Temperate And Moderate, Are Words Either Of Political Cowardice, Or Of Cunning, Or Seduction. A Thing, Moderately Good Is Not So Good As It Ought To Be. Moderation In Temper, Is Always A Virtue; But Moderation In Principle, Is A Species Of Vice.

That Which We Obtain Too Easily, We Esteem Too Lightly.

But If Objects For Gratitude And Admiration Are Our Desire, Do They Not Present Themselves Every Hour To Our Eyes?

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

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.

The Age Of Ignorance Commenced With The Christian System.

The Duty Of Man Is Not A Wilderness Of Turnpike Gates, Through Which He Is To Pass By Tickets From One To The Other. It Is Plain And Simple, And Consists But Of Two Points--his Duty God, Which Every Man Must Feel; And, With Respect To His Neighbor, To Do As He Would Be Done By.

War Ought To Be No Man's Wish.

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

I Do Not Believe In The Creed Professed By The Jewish Church, By The Roman Church, By The Greek Church, By The Turkish Church, By The Protestant Church, Nor By Any Church That I Know Of. My Own Mind Is My Own Church.

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.

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.

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.

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

These Are The Days That Try Man's Heart.

Not A Place Upon Earth Might Be So Happy As America. Her Situation Is Remote From All The Wrangling World, And She Has Nothing To Do But To Trade With Them.

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.

The Deist Needs None Of Those Tricks And Shows Called Miracles To Confirm His Faith, For What Can Be A Greater Miracle Than The Creation Itself, And His Own Existence?

You Cannot Undermine Police Authority And Then Complain About Rising Crime.

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.

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!

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

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

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

Immediate Necessity Makes Many Things Convenient, Which If Continued Would Grow Into Oppressions.

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

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 Only Idea Man Can Affix To The Name Of God, Is That Of A First Cause, The Cause Of All Things. And, Incomprehensibly Difficult As It Is For A Man To Conceive What A First Cause Is, He Arrives At The Belief Of It, From The Tenfold Greater Difficulty Of Disbelieving It. It Is Difficult Beyond Description To Conceive That Space Can Have No End; But It Is More Difficult To Conceive An End. It Is Difficult Beyond The Power Of Man To Conceive An Eternal Duration Of What We Call Time; But It Is More Impossible To Conceive A Time When There Shall Be No Time.

The Almighty Implanted In Us These Inextinguishable Feelings For Good And Wise Purposes. They Are The Guardians Of His Image In Our Heart. They Distinguish Us From The Herd Of Common Animals.

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

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

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.

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.

The Whole Religious Complexion Of The Modern World Is Due To The Absence From Jerusalem Of A Lunatic Asylum.

What We Obtain Too Cheap, We Esteem Too Lightly: It Is Dearness Only That Gives Every Thing Its Value. Heaven Knows How To Put A Proper Price Upon Its Goods; And It Would Be Strange Indeed If So Celestial An Article As Freedom Should Not Be Highly Rated.

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

On This Question Of War, Three Things Are To Be Considered. First, The Right Of Declaring It: Secondly, The Expense Of Supporting It: Thirdly, The Mode Of Conducting It After It Is Declared.

The Vatican Is A Dagger In The Heart Of Italy.

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.

Some Writers Have So Confounded Society With Government, As To Leave Little Or No Distinction Between Them; Whereas They Are Not Only Different, But Have Different Origins ... Society Is In Every State A Blessing, But Government, Even In Its Best State, Is But A Necessary Evil; In Its Worst State, An Intolerable One.

[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.

An Army Of Principles Will Penetrate Where An Army Of Soldiers Cannot.

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.

It Is Necessary To The Happiness Of Man That He Be Mentally Faithful To Himself. Infidelity Does Not Consist In Believing, Or In Disbelieving, It Consists In Professing To Believe What He Does Not Believe.

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.

That There Are Men In All Countries Who Get Their Living By War, And By Keeping Up The Quarrels Of Nations Is As Shocking As It Is True.

Human Nature Is Not Of Itself Vicious.

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

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

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.

Public Credit Is Suspicion Asleep.

The Most Extraordinary Of All The Things Called Miracles, Related In The New Testament, Is That Of The Devil Flying Away With Jesus Christ, And Carrying Him To The Top Of A High Mountain; And To The Top Of The Highest Pinnacle Of The Temple, And Showing Him And Promising To Him All The Kingdoms Of The World . How Happened It That He Did Not Discover America? Or Is It Only With Kingdoms That His Sooty Highness Has Any Interest.

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.

The Creation Speaks A Universal Language, Independent Of Human Speech Or Human Language, Multiplied And Various As They Be. It Is An Ever-existing Original, Which Every Man Can Read. It Cannot Be Forged; It Cannot Be Counterfeited; It Cannot Be Lost; It Cannot Be Altered; It Cannot Be Suppressed. It Does Not Depend Upon The Will Of Man Whether It Shall Be Published Or Not; It Publishes Itself From One End Of The Earth To The Other. It Preaches To All Nations And To All Worlds; And This Word Of God Reveals To Man All That Is Necessary For Man To Know Of God.

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?

I Disbelieve All Holy Men And Holy Books.

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

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.

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.

He Who Dares Not Offend Cannot Be Honest.

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.

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.

Society Is Produced By Our Wants And Government By Our Wickedness.

Panics, In Some Cases, Have Their Uses; They Produce As Much Good As Hurt. Their Duration Is Always Short; The Mind Soon Grows Through Them And Acquires A Firmer Habit Than Before. But Their Peculiar Advantage Is, That They Are The Touchstone Of Sincerity And Hypocrisy, And Bring Things And Men To Light, Which Might Have Lain Forever Undiscovered.

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.

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

Every Science Has For Its Basis A System Of Principles As Fixed And Unalterable As Those By Which The Universe Is Regulated And Governed. Man Cannot Make Principles; He Can Only Discover Them.

I Have Always Strenuously Supported The Right Of Every Man To His Own Opinion, However Different That Opinion Might Be To Mine. He Who Denies To Another This Right, Makes A Slave Of Himself To His Present Opinion, Because He Precludes Himself The Right Of Changing It.

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.

Government Has No Right To Make Itself A Party In Any Debates Respecting The Principles Or Mode Of Forming Or Of Changing, Constitutions. It Is Not For The Benefit Of Those Who Exercise The Powers Of Government, That Constitutions, And The Governments Issuing From Them, Are Established.

Whence Arose All The Horrid Assassinations Of Whole Nations Of Men, Women, And Infants, With Which The Bible Is Filled; And The Bloody Persecutions, And Tortures Unto Death, And Religiosu Wars, That Since That Time Have Laid Europe In Blood And Ashes; Whence Arose They, But From This Impious Thing Called Religion, And This Monstrous Belief That God Has Spoken To Man?

If There Must Be Trouble, Let It Be In My Day, That My Child May Have Peace.

I Call Not Upon A Few, But Upon All: Not On This State Or That State, But On Every State; Up And Help Us; Lay Your Shoulders To The Wheel; Better Have Too Much Force Than Too Little, When So Great An Object Is At Stake.

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.

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?

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.

Infidelity Does Not Consist In Believing, Or In Disbelieving; It Consists In Professing To Believe What He Does Not Believe. It Is Impossible To Calculate The Moral Mischief, If I May So Express It, That Mental Lying Has Produced In Society. When A Man Has So Far Corrupted And Prostituted The Chastity Of His Mind, As To Subscribe His Professional Belief To Things He Does Not Believe, He Has Prepared Himself For The Commission Of Every Other Crime.

The Study Of Theology, As It Stands In The Christian Churches, Is The Study Of Nothing.

...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 Intimacy Which Is Contracted In Infancy, And Friendship Which Is Formed In Misfortune, Are, Of All Others, The Most Lasting And Unalterable.

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

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.

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.

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

The Reformation Was Preceded By The Discovery Of America, As If The Almighty Graciously Meant To Open A Sanctuary To The Persecuted In Future Years, When Home Should Afford Neither Friendship Nor Safety.

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.

As Parents, We Can Have No Joy, Knowing That This Government Is Not Sufficiently Lasting To Ensure Any Thing Which We May Bequeath To Posterity: And By A Plain Method Of Argument, As We Are Running The Next Generation Into Debt, We Ought To Do The Work Of It, Otherwise We Use Them Meanly And Pitifully. In Order To Discover The Line Of Our Duty Rightly, We Should Take Our Children In Our Hand, And Fix Our Station A Few Years Farther Into Life; That Eminence Will Present A Prospect, Which A Few Present Fears And Prejudices Conceal From Our Sight.

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.

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.

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.

It Was Needless, After This, To Say That All Was Vanity And Vexation Of Spirit; For It Is Impossible To Derive Happiness From The Company Of Those Whom We Deprive Of Happiness.

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

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.

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

The Graceful Pride Of Truth Knows No Extremes, And Preserves, In Every Latitude Of Life, The Right-angled Character Of Man.

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.

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

Founding Fathers Atheist

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.

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.

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

I Know Not Whether Taxes Are Raised To Fight Wars, Or Wars Are Fought In Order To Raise Taxes.

The Choicest Gift Of God To Man, The Gift Of Reason; And Having Endeavoured To Force Upon Himself The Belief Of A System Against Which Reason Revolts, He Ungratefully Calls It Human Reason; As If Man Could Give Reason To Himself.

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.

...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.

When The Rich Plunder The Poor Of His Rights, It Becomes An Example For The Poor To Plunder The Rich Of His Property, For The Rights Of The One Are As Much Property To Him As Wealth Is Property To The Other, And The Little All Is As Dear As The Much. It Is Only By Setting Out On Just Principles That Men Are Trained To Be Just To Each Other; And It Will Always Be Found, That When The Rich Protect The Rights Of The Poor, The Poor Will Protect The Property Of The Rich. But The Guarantee, To Be Effectual, Must Be Parliamentarily Reciprocal.

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

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.

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.

The Strength And Power Of Despotism Consists Wholly In The Fear Of Resistance.

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.

My Country Is The World, And My Religion Is To Do Good.

Virtue Is Not Hereditary.

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

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.

It Is Error Only, And Not Truth, That Shrinks From Inquiry.

It Is Not A Charity But A Right, Not Bounty But Justice, That I Am Pleading For. The Present State Of Civilization Is As Odious As It Is Unjust. It Is Absolutely The Opposite Of What It Should Be, And It Is Necessary That A Revolution Should Be Made In It. The Contrast Of Affluence And Wretchedness Continually Meeting And Offending The Eye, Is Like Dead And Living Bodies Chained Together

The Balance Of Power Is The Scale Of Peace. The Same Balance Would Be Preserved Were All The World Not Destitute Of Arms, For All Would Be Alike; But Since Some Will Not, Others Dare Not Lay Them Aside ... Horrid Mischief Would Ensue Were One Half The World Deprived Of The Use Of Them ... The Weak Will Become Prey To The Strong.

It Is An Affront To Treat Falsehood With Complaisance.

Man Must Go Back To Nature For Information.

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.

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

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

Representatives

Peace, Which Costs Nothing, Is Attended With Infinitely More Advantage Than Any Victory With All Its Expence.

It Is Unpleasant To See Character Throw Itself Away.

There Exists 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.

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

To Live With Our Enemies As If They May Some Time Become Our Friends, And To Live With Our Friends As If They May Some Time Become Our Enemies, Is Not A Moral But A Political Maxim

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.

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.

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.

Man Did Not Enter Society To Be Worse Off, Or To Have Fewer Rights, But Rather To Have Those Rights Better Secured

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

A Government On The Principles On Which Constitutional Governments Arising Out Of Society Are Established, Cannot Have The Right Of Altering Itself. If It Had, It Would Be Arbitrary. It Might Make Itself What It Pleased; And Wherever Such A Right Is Set Up, It Shows There Is No Constitution.

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.

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.

A Long Habit Of Not Thinking A Thing Wrong, Gives It A Superficial Appearance Of Being Right, And Raises At First A Formidable Outcry In Defense Of Custom. But The Tumult Soon Subsides. Time Makes More Converts Than Reason.

There Is A Natural Firmness In Some Minds, Which Cannot Be Unlocked By Trifles, But Which, When Unlocked, Discovers A Cabinet Of Fortitude.

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.

But In Addition To All The Moral Evidence Against The Bible, I Will, In The Progress Of This Work, Produce Such Other Evidence As Even A Priest Cannot Deny; And Show, From That Evidence, That The Bible Is Not Entitled To Credit, As Being The Word Of God.

Some People Can Be Reasoned Into Sense, And Others Must Be Shocked Into It.

When All Other Rights Are Taken Away, The Right Of Rebellion Is Made Perfect.

The Countries The Most Famous And The Most Respected Of Antiquity Are Those Which Distinguished Themselves By Promoting And Patronizing Science, And On The Contrary Those Which Neglected Or Discouraged It Are Universally Denominated Rude And Barbarous.

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.

Reason Obeys Itself; And Ignorance Submits To Whatever Is Dictated To It.

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

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.

When Men Yield Up The Privilege Of Thinking, The Last Shadow Of Liberty Quits The Horizon.

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.

Wrong Cannot Have A Legal Descendant.

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

Where Knowledge Is A Duty, Ignorance Is A Crime.

No Falsehood Is So Fatal As That Which Is Made An Article Of Faith.

The Most Horrible Wickedness And Cruelties, And The Greatest Miseries That Have Troubled The Human Race Began With This Thing Called Revelation, Or Revealed Religion. ... It Would Be Far, Far Better For Us To Let A Thousand Devils Roam The World, And Publicly Preach The Doctrine Of Devils (if There Were Such A Thing, Which There Isn't), Than To Let One Impostor And Monster Such A Moses, Joshua, Samuel Or The Bible Prophets Come Speaking The So-called Word Of God, And Causing Men To Believe It.

Priests And Conjurors Are Of The Same Trade.

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

The State Of A King Shuts Him From The World, Yet The Business Of A King Requires Him To Know It Thoroughly.

We Must Be Compelled To Hold This Doctrine To Be False, And The Old And New Law Called The Old And New Testament, To Be Impositions, Fables And Forgeries.

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.

The Moral Duty Of Man Consists Of Imitatingthe Moral Goodness And Beneficence Of God,manifested In The Creation, Toward All His Creatures.

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.

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