Positive Atheism’s Big List of Quotations
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Ferdinand August Bebel (1840-1913) German socialist leader
When socialism comes into power, the Roman Church will advocate socialism with the same vigor [with which] it is now favoring feudalism and slavery. .
Irish-born writer known for his absurdist plays; winner of the Nobel Prize for literature in 1969; his Collected Works, published in 1970, span 16 volumes
Just under the surface I shall be, all together at first, then separate and drift, through all the earth and perhaps in the end through a cliff into the sea, something of me. A ton of worms in an acre, that is a wonderful thought, a ton of worms, I believe it.
Enough of acting the infant who has been told so often how he was found under a cabbage that in the end he remembers the exact spot in the garden and the kind of life he led there before joining the family circle. If Godot were God I would have called him that. What do I know of man’s destiny? I could tell you more about radishes. .
Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887) US clergyman; abolitionist
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American cleric, father of Catharine Esther Beecher (1800-1878), a suffragist; Edward Beecher (1803-1895), a clergyman, educator, and abolitionist; Henry Ward Beecher (1813-1887), a clergyman, newspaper editor, and abolitionist; Harriet Beecher Stowe.
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American Baptist minister; author of the original Pledge of Allegiance; brother of Socialist author Edward Bellamy, whose Socialist convictions Francis shared, costing him his pastorate in Boston in 1891 for refusing to hide his Socialist convictions during the course of his sermons
Just here arose the temptation of the historic slogan of the French Revolution which meant so much to Jefferson and his friends, “Liberty, Equality, Fraternity.” No, that would be too fanciful, too many thousands of years off in realization. But we as a nation do stand square on the doctrine of liberty and justice for all. I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. [A] ... clumsy redundancy ... a mangling of the original. .
Baer: Quadricentennial Columbus Day Celebration “In 1892 Francis Bellamy was also a chairman of a committee of state superintendents of education in the National Education Association. As its chairman, he prepared the program for the public schools’ quadricentennial celebration for Columbus Day in 1892. He structured this public school program around a flag raising ceremony and a flag salute, his ‘Pledge of Allegiance.’” .
Granddaughter: Would Have Resented ‘Under God’ “Bellamy’s granddaughter said he also would have resented this second change ... In his retirement in Florida, he stopped attending church because he disliked the racial bigotry he found there.” Grandson: Changes ‘Spoiled the Poetry’ of the Pledge He [Frances Bellamy] thought [the changes] spoiled the poetry of it. He was a pretty stern guy. Everybody has some sense of humor, but I don’t think he had much. Great-grandson: Bellamy Unhappy With Changes There’s a little irony in the fact that his [Francis Bellamy’s] profession was a Baptist minister. You’d think immediately he would not have had bad feelings about having “under God” in the Pledge. But he was not even happy about them adding “to the United States of America.” Great-granddaughter: Godless Pledge Invites More Americans As a regular churchgoer who has voted both Democratic and Republican, I believe that my great-grandfather [Francis Bellamy] got it right. A Pledge of Allegiance that does not include God invites the participation of more Americans. .
Grandson of Francis Bellamy, who wrote the original Pledge of Allegiance He [Frances Bellamy] thought [the changes] spoiled the poetry of it. He was a pretty stern guy. Everybody has some sense of humor, but I don’t think he had much. .
Great-grandson of Francis Bellamy, who wrote the original Pledge of Allegiance; owner of Bellamy’s sandwich shop in Trinity Commons in Cordova, Tennessee There’s a little irony in the fact that his [Francis Bellamy’s] profession was a Baptist minister. You’d think immediately he would not have had bad feelings about having “under God” in the Pledge. But he was not even happy about them adding “to the United States of America.” .
DeRobigne Mortimer (D M) Bennett Founder, publisher, and editor of The Truth Seeker; Stood up to (and was later imprisoned by of the zealous meddling of) the infamous postal inspector Anthony Comstock — after whom the terms “Comstockery” and “Comstockism” were coined; although President Hayes pardoned the author of the book Bennett was convicted of selling, the later regretful president refused to free the sixty-something Bennett from his sentence at a hard-labor prison
Worse than all other mean acts are those performed by hypocrites under the cloak of purity and virtue. Has not the religion called after your name caused more bloodshed, more persecution, and more suffering than all the other religions of the world?
I have learned to modify my prejudices... I am ready to believe Hamlet was right when he assured his friend Horatio that there was more in heaven and earth many things not dreamed of in his philosophy. I am well aware it has many defects, like all I do. I have a long road before me to reach perfection.
Those who claim to speak for the Gods simply speak their own thought. The Gods do not speak; they are as dumb as the rocks — With Nature it is not so. To know her is to know the truth, and to study her is to be wise. .
Bennett was “Our Thomas Paine” Mr Bennett brought to our philosophical Liberalism a smack of human nature; he poured into it the freshness and vigor of the soil ... He was our Thomas Paine, and he spoke words of thrilling common sense. .
Bennett Defended in Court and In Prison ... You have violated no law, committed no wrong, and made no being unhappy. You have lived an honorable, useful life, and in any country not governed by Christians you would be free and respected.... .
Reinhold Niebuhr Professor of Social Ethics at Union Theological Seminary, New York City; Dean of Union Theological Seminary The first reason for emphasizing the separation of church and state is that it is the only way of assuring the complete freedom of the church.... The second reason for believing in the separation of church and state is the preservation of the state from control by the church.... The third reason for emphasizing the separation of church and state is that it is best for the church to be on its own. It is obvious that the churches in America should not use their members as political pressure groups to get special ecclesiastical privileges for themselves as against other religious bodies. They should not seek legislation, even if they can influence enough votes to get it, which interferes with the religious liberty of minorities and they should be thankful that the courts stand guard at this point. .
British reformer and philosopher of law and legislation, who laid the foundations of utilitarianism
The spirit of dogmatic theology poisons anything it touches. No power of government ought to be employed in the endeavor to establish any system or article of belief on the subject of religion. .
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Christianity is the enemy of liberty and of civilization. It has kept mankind in chains.
The bastard! He doesn’t exist!
How can one better magnify the Almighty than by sniggering with him at his little jokes, particularly the poorer ones.
There is tonic in the things that men do not love to hear. Free speech is to a great people what the winds are to
oceans ... and where free speech is stopped miasma
The true reason for allegiance to the Flag is the “republic for which it stands.”... And what does
that vast thing, the Republic mean? It is the concise political word for the Nation the One Nation which the Civil War was fought to prove. To make that One Nation idea clear, we must specify that it is indivisible, as Webster and Lincoln used to repeat
in their great speeches. And its future?
We honestly believe Christianity to be false, to be the greatest sham in the world, without truth in its history, without loveliness in its
doctrines, without benefit to the human race, and without anything to sustain it in the hold it has upon the world.
Finally, as you now view the field, the past, the present, and the future, would it not, in your opinion, be better to wipe out from the face of
the earth all the priestcraft, superstition, sectarianism, falsehood, all the absurdities and monstrosities, which have so preyed upon mankind, and to inaugurate an era of truth, reason, common sense, science, education, simplicity, fraternity, and humanity;
discarding false gods, base devils, useless saviors, and degrading creeds, and to devote our time and attention to the improvement of this world and to the happiness of the human race?
It is, perhaps, very fitting that the old lecher who is capable of committing
adultery with half of the females of his large congregation, and then coming into court and for thirteen consecutive days perjuring himself ... slander and defamation are poor weapons for those who set themselves up as teachers and guides of morality for
the world. But “they all do it.” The more purity they profess, the more false and hypocritical they are.
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There is no pestilence in a state like a zeal for religion, independent of morality.