Robert Green Ingersoll
Robert Green Ingersoll
Robert Green "Bob" Ingersollwas an American lawyer, a Civil War veteran, political leader, and orator of the United States during the Golden Age of Free Thought, noted for his broad range of culture and his defense of agnosticism. He was nicknamed "The Great Agnostic"...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionLawyer
Date of Birth11 August 1833
CountryUnited States of America
running hate believe
I honestly believe that the doctrine of hell was born in the glittering eyes of snakes that run in frightful coils watching for their prey. I believe it was born with the yelping, howling, growling and snarling of wild beasts... I despise it, I defy it, and I hate it.
hate believe men
If a man really believes that God once upheld slavery; that he commanded soldiers to kill women and babes; that he believed in polygamy; that he persecuted for opinion's sake; that he will punish forever, and that he hates an unbeliever, the effect in my judgment will be bad. It always has been bad. This belief built the dungeons of the Inquisition. This belief made the Puritan murder the Quaker.
hate ideas able
In my judgment, the Deists were all successfully answered. The god of nature is certainly as bad as the God of the Old Testament. It is only when we discard the idea of a deity, the idea of cruelty or goodness in nature, that we are able ever to bear with patience the ills of life. I feel that I am neither a favorite nor a victim. Nature neither loves nor hates me.
hate men worship
To hate man and worship God seems to be the sum of all the creeds.
lying hate creator-god
Nothing could add to the horror of hell, except the presence of its creator, God. While I have life, as long as I draw breath, I shall deny with all my strength, and hate with every drop of my blood, this infinite lie.
hate home sunshine
I hate above all things a cross man. What right has he to murder the sunshine of a day? What right has he to assassinate the Joy of life? When you go home, you ought to go like a ray of light-so that it will, even in the night, burst out of the doors and windows and illuminate the darkness.
hate religion church
The church hates a thinker precisely for the same reason a robber dislikes a sheriff, or a thief despises the prosecuting witness.
belong filled four nor religion thousand wherever
You need not go back four thousand years for heroines. The world is filled with them today. They do not belong to any nation, nor to any religion, nor exclusively to any race. Wherever woman is found, they are found.
change men physically
You have to change men physically before you change them intellectually.
dreary elevates happiness loves shop whether whoever works
Whoever labors for the happiness of those he loves elevates himself, no matter whether he works in the dreary shop or the perfumed field.
human lower sympathy
What is it that distinguishes you and me from the lower animals - from the beasts? More, I say, than anything else, human sympathy - human sympathy.
art builds defended fills home love passion purity sacredness walt whitman
Walt Whitman defended the sacredness of love, the purity of passion - the passion that builds every home and fills the world with art and song.
expense full giving ideas life prince subjects summer
Voltaire, as full of life as summer is full of blossoms, giving his ideas upon all subjects at the expense of prince and king, was exiled to England.
cannot creed dogma freely permitted until
Until every soul is freely permitted to investigate every book and creed and dogma for itself, the world cannot be free.