“The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid cruelties, and the greatest miseries, that have afflicted the human race have had their origin in this thing called revelation, or revealed religion....”

“Let them call me a rebel and welcome. I feel no concern from it. But should I suffer the misery of devils, were I to make a whore of my soul.”

“It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry.”

“Nothing, they say is more certain than death, and nothing more uncertain than the time of dying”

“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...”

“The mind once enlightened cannot again become dark.”

“Happiness and the absurd are two sons of the same earth. They are inseparable.”

“We can regard our life as a uselessly disturbing episode in the blissful repose of nothingness.”

“We no longer believe because it is absurd: it is absurd because we must believe.”

“To others, the universe seems decent because decent people have welded eyes. That is why they fear lewdness. They are never frightened by the crowing of a rooster or when strolling under a starry h...”

“If you thought with your minds and not your roosters, you would get the point!”

“The difference twixt poet and coxcomb is precisely that the latter stops gaps like a ship fitter caulking seams, merely to keep the boat afloat, while the former doth his work as doth a man with a ...”

“I have no desire for others to take it on themselves to analyze my thoughts. I am without thoughts. I have never, not even once, acted on the basis of any doctrine or philosophy.I am convinced that...”

“This is my doctrine: Give every other human being every right you claim for yourself.”

“Without the voice of reason, every faith is its own curse.")”