“This will be obtained chiefly by means of the schools, and by open, hearty behavior, show, condescension, popularity, and toleration of their prejudices, which we shall at leisure root out and dispel.”

If a writer publishes any thing that attracts notice, and is in itself just, but does not accord with our plan

We must win the common people in every corner.

And it will fire them the more, and cause them to work for us with zeal, without knowing that they do so.

The human race will then become one family, and the world will be the dwelling of Rational Men.

A Literary Society is the most proper form for the introduction of our Order into any state where we are yet strangers.

The revolution which is about to break will be sterile if it is not complete.

But I have contrived an explanation which has every advantage; is inviting to christians of every communion; gradually frees them from all religious prejudices

This is the great object held out by this association; and the means of attaining it is illumination, enlightening the understanding by the sun of reason which will dispell the clouds of superstition and of prejudice.

It was the full conviction of this, and of what could be done,

Let it never appear in any place in its own name but always covered by another name and another occupation.

Salvation does not lie where strong thrones are defended by swords, where the smoke of censers ascend to heaven or where thousands of strong men pace the rich fields of harvest.

I am proud to be known to the world as the founder of the Illuminati.

And of all illumination which human reason can give, none is comparable to the discovery of what we are, our nature, our obligations, what happiness we are capable of, and what are the means of attaining it.

By establishing reading societies, and subscription libraries, and taking these under our direction, and supplying them through our labors

The most wonderful thing of all is that the distinguished Lutheran and Calvinist theologians who belong to our order really believe that they see in it (Illuminati) the true and genuine sense of Christian Religion.

The tenor of my life has been the opposite of everything that is vile, and no man can lay any such thing to my charge.

The first Rudiments of Morality, broach’d by skilful Politicians, to render Men useful to each other as well as tractable, were chiefly contrived that the Ambitious might reap the more Benefit from, and govern vast Numbers of them with the greater Ease and Security.

The mathematical difficulties of the theory of rotation arise chiefly from the want of geometrical illustrations and sensible images, by which we might fix the results of analysis in our minds.

[M]y work, which I’ve done for a long time, was not pursued in order to gain the praise I now enjoy, but chiefly from a craving after knowledge, which I notice resides in me more than in most other men.

It is changes that are chiefly responsible for diseases, especially the greatest changes, the violent alterations both in the seasons and in other things. (:)…regimen and temperature, and one period of life to another.

Beauty addresses itself chiefly to sight, but there is a beauty for the hearing too.