Belief is not a matter of choice, but of conviction.
The destroyer of weeds, thistles, and thorns is a benefactor whether he soweth grain or not.
Laughing has always been considered by theologians as a crime.
A good deed is the best prayer.
I found that the clergy did not understand their own book.
It cannot be too often repeated, that truth scorns the assistance of miracle.
Orthodoxy cannot afford to put out the fires of hell.
Fear is a dagger with which hypocrisy assassinates the soul.
I believe in the gospel of cheerfulness, the gospel of Good Nature; the gospel of Good Health. Let us pay some attention to our bodies. Take care of our bodies, and our souls will take care of themselves.
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.
Like an armed warrior, like a plumed knight, James G. Blaine marched down the halls of the American Congress and threw his shining lance full and fair against the brazen foreheads of the defamers of his country, and the maligners of his honor.
If I go to heaven I want to take my reason with me.
In the presence of death I affirm and reaffirm the truth of all that I have said against the superstitions of the world. I would say that much on the subject with my last breath.
Every library is an arsenal.
I belong to the Great Church which holds the world within its starlit aisles; that claims the great and good of every race and clime; that finds with joy the grain of gold in every creed, and floods with light and love the germs of good in every soul.
If you have ever clothed another with woe, as with a garment of pain, you will never be quite as happy as though you had not done that thing.
Injustice upon earth renders the justice of of heaven impossible.
The combined wisdom and genius of all mankind cannot possibly conceive of an argument against liberty of thought.
Liberty is the condition of progress. Without Liberty, there remains only barbarism. Without Liberty, there can be no civilization.
It is with men as with other things. The mullein needs only a year, but the oak a century, and the greatest men are those who have continued to grow as long as they have lived.