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Religion quotes

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“On the other hand, I maintain that cosmic religious feeling is the strongest and noblest incitement to scientific research.” Albert Einstein, “The world as I see it” - 1949

“A convert's enthusiasm for his new religion is greater than that of a person who is born in it.” Mahatma Gandhi, “The Story of my Experiments with Truth” - 1929

“I am not religious, I reckon. But peace is my heart: I know it is.” William Faulkner, “As I Lay Dying” - 1930

“Conventionality is not morality. Self-righteousness is not religion. To attack the first is not to assail the last.” Charlotte Brontë, “Jane Eyre” - 16 October 1847

“The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult; and left untried.” G. K. Chesterton, “What's Wrong with the World” - 1910

“In religion, as in war and everything else, comfort is the one thing you cannot get by looking for it.” C. S. Lewis, “Mere Christianity” - 1952

“The development from a religion of fear to moral religion is a great step in a nation's life.” Albert Einstein, “The world as I see it” - 1949

“Religion and spirituality are very different, but people often confuse the two. Some things cannot be taught, but they can be awakened in the heart.” Muhammad Ali, “The Soul of a Butterfly” - 2004

“Love and religion! thought Clarissa, going back into the drawing-room, tingling all over. How detestable, how detestable they are!” Virginia Woolf, “Mrs Dalloway” - 1925

“It is in itself a kind of religion; it does not reason, but it acts from the impulse of faith and of sentiment.” Alexis de Tocqueville, “Democracy in America” - 1835

“So that, in effect, religion, which should most distinguish us from beasts, and ought most peculiarly to elevate us, as rational creatures, above brutes, is that wherein men often appear most irrational, and more senseless than beasts themselves.” John Locke, “An Essay Concerning Human Understanding” - 1689

“RELIGION, n. A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable.” Ambrose Bierce, “The Devil's Dictionary” - 1911

“As, in religion, man is governed by the products of his own brain, so in capitalistic production, he is governed by the products of his own hand.” Karl Marx, “Das Kapital” - 1867

“Accumulate, accumulate! That is Moses and the prophets!” Karl Marx, “Das Kapital” - 1867

“I was an Agnostic. Agnostics didn't have much to argue about.” Charles Bukowski, “Ham on Rye” - 1982

“They have made the happy discovery, that the way to silence religious disputes, is to take no notice of them.” Thomas Jefferson, “Notes on the State of Virginia” - 1785

“The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbour to say there are twenty gods, or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg.” Thomas Jefferson, “Notes on the State of Virginia” - 1785

“Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.” Blaise Pascal, “Pensées” - 1670

“Religions are places to stand and look and act, vantage points from which to view the world.” Neil Gaiman, “American Gods” - 2001

“People who are religious should be glad, since not everyone is blessed with the ability to believe in a higher order.” Anne Frank, “The Diary of a Young Girl” - 1947

“Religion, in short, is a monumental chapter in the history of human egotism.” William James, “The Varieties of Religious Experience” - 1902

“My best advice to anyone who wants to raise a happy, mentally healthy child is: Keep him or her as far away from a church as you can.” Frank Zappa, “The Real Frank Zappa Book” - 1989

“Religion, the dominion of the human mind; Property, the dominion of human needs; and Government, the dominion of human conduct, represent the stronghold of man's enslavement and all the horrors it entails.” Emma Goldman, “Anarchism and Other Essays” - 1910

“Don’t wait for the Last Judgment. It takes place every day.” Albert Camus, “The Fall” - 1956

“What have I always believed? That on the whole, and by and large, if a man lived properly, not according to what any priests said, but according to what seemed decent and honest inside, then it would, at the end, more or less, turn out all right.” Terry Pratchett, “Small Gods” - 1992

“The beauty of religious mania is that it has the power to explain everything. Once God (or Satan) is accepted as the first cause of everything which happens in the mortal world, nothing is left to chance... or change.” Stephen King, “The Stand” - 1978

“Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.” David Hume, “A Treatise of Human Nature” - 1738

“he hoped the people saw him in the church, because he was a cripple, and it might be pleasant to them to remember upon Christmas Day, who made lame beggars walk, and blind men see.” Charles Dickens, “A Christmas Carol” - 1843

“They blended religion and art and science because, at base, science is no more than an investigation of a miracle we can never explain, and art is an interpretation of that miracle.” Ray Bradbury, “The Martian Chronicles” - 1950

“Gods don’t like people not doing much work. People who aren’t busy all the time might start to think.” Terry Pratchett, “Small Gods” - 1992

“Humans! They lived in a world where the grass continued to be green and the sun rose every day and flowers regularly turned into fruit, and what impressed them? Weeping statues. And wine made out of water!” Terry Pratchett, “Small Gods” - 1992

“Anybody who wants religion is welcome to it, as far as I'm concerned—I support your right to enjoy it. However, I would appreciate it if you exhibited more respect for the rights of those people who do not wish to share your dogma, rapture or...” Frank Zappa, “The Real Frank Zappa Book” - 1989

“I have no objection to any person’s religion, be it what it may, so long as that person does not kill or insult any other person, because that other person don’t believe it also.” Herman Melville, “Moby-Dick” - 1851

“religion, and not fear, has ever been the cause of the long-lived prosperity of an absolute government.” Alexis de Tocqueville, “Democracy in America” - 1835

“What good is religion if it collapses under calamity? Think of what earthquakes and floods, wars and volcanoes, have done before to men! Did you think God had exempted Weybridge? He is not an insurance agent.” H. G. Wells, “The War of the Worlds” - 1898

“Anyone unable to understand how a useful religion can be founded on lies will not understand this book either.” Kurt Vonnegut, “Cat's Cradle” - 1963

“The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.” William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice” - 1600

“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, “A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man” - 1916

“Tom counted the pages of the sermon; after church he always knew how many pages there had been, but he seldom knew anything else about the discourse.” Mark Twain, “The Adventures of Tom Sawyer” - 1876

“My future husband was becoming to me my whole world; and more than the world: almost my hope of heaven. He stood between me and every thought of religion, as an eclipse intervenes between man and the broad sun. I could not, in those days, see God...” Charlotte Brontë, “Jane Eyre” - 16 October 1847

“Thought he, it's a wicked world in all meridians; I'll die a pagan.” Herman Melville, “Moby-Dick” - 1851

“I am not asking anyone to accept Christianity if his best reasoning tells him that the weight of the evidence is against it.” C. S. Lewis, “Mere Christianity” - 1952

“If you look for truth, you may find comfort in the end: if you look for comfort you will not get either comfort or truth—only soft soap and wishful thinking to begin with and, in the end, despair.” C. S. Lewis, “Mere Christianity” - 1952

“A man's ethical behaviour should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear and punishment and hope of reward after death.” Albert Einstein, “The world as I see it” - 1949

“How can cosmic religious feeling be communicated from one person to another, if it can give rise to no definite notion of a God and no theology? In my view, it is the most important function of art and science to awaken this feeling and keep it...” Albert Einstein, “The world as I see it” - 1949

“If we continue to think and live as if we belong only to different cultures and different religions, with separate missions and goals, we will always be in self-defeating competition with each other.” Muhammad Ali, “The Soul of a Butterfly” - 2004

“We all have the same God, we just serve him differently. Rivers, lakes, ponds, streams, oceans, all have different names, but they all contain water.” Muhammad Ali, “The Soul of a Butterfly” - 2004

“As men's prayers are a disease of the will, so are their creeds a disease of the intellect.” Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance” - 1841

“Yes, we inevitably turn to God; for this religious sentiment is of its nature so pure, so delightful to the soul that experiences it, that it makes up to us for all our other losses.” Aldous Huxley, “Brave New World” - 1932

“I see no good reasons why the views given in this volume should shock the religious feelings of any one.” Charles Darwin, “On The Origin of Species” - 1859

Related topics

God belief science morality reason truth fear faith government miracle slavery Christianity difference love ignorance evil heart freedom will comfort

Related authors

C. S. Lewis (6)
Albert Einstein (4)
Thomas Jefferson (4)
Carl Sagan (4)
Muhammad Ali (3)
Ambrose Bierce (3)
Terry Pratchett (3)
William James (3)
Charlotte Brontë (2)
Herman Melville (2)
Virginia Woolf (2)
David Hume (2)
Mahatma Gandhi (2)
Martin Luther (2)
Alexis de Tocqueville (2)
Frederick Douglass (2)
Karl Marx (2)
Immanuel Kant (2)
Charles Bukowski (2)
Isaac Asimov (2)

Related sources

Mere Christianity (4)
The world as I see it (4)
Notes on the State of Virginia (4)
The Soul of a Butterfly (3)
The Devil's Dictionary (3)
The Varieties of Religious Experience (3)
Small Gods (3)
Contact (3)
Jane Eyre (2)
Moby-Dick (2)
Mrs Dalloway (2)
The Story of my Experiments with Truth (2)
Democracy in America (2)
Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave (2)
Das Kapital (2)
Critique of Pure Reason (2)
Ham on Rye (2)
Foundation (2)
The Real Frank Zappa Book (2)
The Screwtape Letters (2)