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Browse all 10,075 quotes or apply filters in different categories to narrow your search.
Philosophical literature8 quotes
Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world…it is the opium of the people. — Karl Marx · 1883My country is the world, and my religion is to do good. — Thomas Paine · 1792Any system of religion that has any thing in it that shocks the mind of a child cannot be a true system. — Thomas Paine · 1794Religion; which by reason of the different fancies, judgments, and passions of several men, hath grown up into ceremonies so different, that those which are used by one man, are for the most part ridiculous to another. — Thomas Hobbes · 1651Religion in its humility restores man to his only dignity, the courage to live by grace. — George Santayana · 1925What religion a man shall have is a historical accident, quite as much as what language he shall speak. — George Santayana · 1905All 8 quotes →Religious literature6 quotes
What indeed has Athens to do with Jerusalem? — Tertullian · 220Many religions now come before us with ingratiating smirks and outspread hands, like an unctuous merchant in a bazaar. They offer consolation and solidarity and uplift, competing as they do in a marketplace. But we have a right to remember how barbarically they behaved when they were strong and were making an offer that people could not refuse. — Christopher Hitchens · 2007No compulsion is there in religion. — Muhammad · 632It is certainly no part of religion to compel religion. — Tertullian · 217Any system of religion that has any thing in it that shocks the mind of a child cannot be a true system. — Thomas Paine · 1794By religion, then, I understand a propitiation or conciliation of powers superior to man which are believed to direct and control the course of nature and of human life. — James George Frazer · 1922Political literature4 quotes
My country is the world, and my religion is to do good. — Thomas Paine · 1792Religion; which by reason of the different fancies, judgments, and passions of several men, hath grown up into ceremonies so different, that those which are used by one man, are for the most part ridiculous to another. — Thomas Hobbes · 1651Liberty cannot be established without morality, nor morality without faith. — Alexis de Tocqueville · 1835All religion, however, is nothing but the fantastic reflection in men's minds of those external forces which control their daily life. — Friedrich Engels · 1878Psychological literature2 quotes
A genuine first-hand religious experience... Is bound to be a heterodoxy to its witnesses, the prophet appearing as a mere lonely madman. If his doctrine prove contagious enough to spread to any others, it becomes a definite and labeled heresy. But if it then still prove contagious enough to triumph over persecution, it becomes itself an orthodoxy, its day of inwardness is over: the spring is dry; the faithful live at second hand exclusively and stone the prophets in their turn. — William James · 1902Religion is illusion, and it derives its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires. — Sigmund Freud · 1933Scientific literature2 quotes
There are reverent minds who ceaselessly scan the fields of Nature and the books of Science in search for gaps-gaps which they will fill up with God. As if God lived in gaps? — Henry Drummond · 1894The priest persuades humble people to endure their hard lot; the politician urges them to rebel against it; and the scientist thinks of a method that does away with the hard lot altogether. — Max Perutz · 1989Adventure1 quote
In a few hundred years, science has taken us farther in understanding the universe, than religion has in 10,000. — Santosh Patel · 2012Adventure (film)1 quote
In a few hundred years, science has taken us farther in understanding the universe, than religion has in 10,000. — Santosh Patel · 2012Anti-colonial literature1 quote
In reality there are as many religions as there are individuals. — Mahatma Gandhi · 1909Autobiography and memoir1 quote
Sex and religion are bordering states. They use the same vocabulary, share like ecstasies, and often serve as a substitute for one another. — Jessamyn West · 1973Comedy1 quote
I always say, religion is a fine thing, taken in moderation. — Coleman · 1983Drama1 quote
In a few hundred years, science has taken us farther in understanding the universe, than religion has in 10,000. — Santosh Patel · 2012Drama (film)1 quote
In a few hundred years, science has taken us farther in understanding the universe, than religion has in 10,000. — Santosh Patel · 2012Historical literature1 quote
The various modes of worship which prevailed in the Roman world were all considered by the people as equally true; by the philosopher as equally false; and by the magistrate as equally useful. And thus toleration produced not only mutual indulgence, but even religious concord. — Edward Gibbon · 1776Modernist literature1 quote
It is a curious thing, do you know, Cranly said dispassionately, how your mind is supersaturated with the religion in which you say you disbelieve. — James Joyce · 1915Political speech1 quote
Old religious factions are volcanoes burnt out. — Edmund Burke · 1792Satire1 quote
We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another. — Jonathan Swift · 1711Science fiction1 quote
The most preposterous notion that Homo sapiens has ever dreamed up is that the Lord God of Creation, Shaper and Ruler of all the Universes, wants the saccharine adoration of His creatures, can be swayed by their prayers, and becomes petulant if He does not receive this flattery. Yet this absurd fantasy, without a shred of evidence to bolster it, pays all the expenses of the oldest, largest, and least productive industry in all history. — Robert A. Heinlein · 1973Tragedy (play)1 quote
I count religion but a childish toy, and hold there is no sin but ignorance. — Christopher Marlowe · 1593Travel writing1 quote
The church is always trying to get other people to reform; it might not be a bad idea to reform itself a little by way of example. — Mark Twain · 1880