“The world is not as it was when it came from its Maker’s hands.”

Indirectly modifying the whole surface of the earth, breaking in upon any supposition of zoological continuity, and utterly unaccounted for by what we have any right to call the laws of nature.

A cold atheistical materialism is the tendency of the so-called material philosophy of the present day.

Yet Mr. Lyell will admit no greater paroxysms than we ourselves have witnessed-no periods of feverish spasmodic energy, during which the very framework of nature has been convulsed and torn asunder.

And why is this done? For no other reason, I am sure, except to make us independent of a Creator.

The sober facts of geology shuffled, so as to play a rogue’s game; phrenology (that sinkhole of human folly and prating coxcombry); spontaneous generation; transmutation of species; and I know not what; all to be swallowed, without tasting and trying

The powers of nature are never in repose; her work never stands still.

[Vestiges begins] from principles which are at variance with all sober inductive truth.

Our book becomes more clear, and nature seems to speak to us in language so like our own, that we easily comprehend it.

It has been modified by many great revolutions, brought about by an inner mechanism of which we very imperfectly comprehend the movements; but of which we gain a glimpse by studying their effects:

And their many causes still acting on the surface of our globe with undiminished power, which are changing, and will continue to change it, as long as it shall last.

we may then see the muscular integuments, and sinews, and bones of our mother Earth,

We cannot take one step in geology without drawing upon the fathomless stores of by-gone time.

The pretended physical philosophy of modern days strips Man of all his moral attributes

From first to last it is a dish of rank materialism cleverly cooked up.

But just as we begin to enter on the history of physical changes going on before our eyes, and in which we ourselves bear a part,

Volcanic action is essentially paroxysmal

To be frivolous time-wasters, delighted in putting her favorite volumes into her grandchildren’s hands.

The important thing is that he shook hands with us over the phone.

Several thousand people had been locked up unjustly and, by an incredible coincidence, all in the same prison. On the other hand, they knew an awful lot about how to knife somebody.

That’s what we’re all doing, all the time, whether we know it or not. Whether we like it or not. Creating something on the spur of the moment with the materials at hand.

Our Palestinian brethren continue to be slaughtered at the hands of Israelis while the world turns the other cheek.

If asked whether you love God, say nothing. This is because if you say, ‘I do not love God,’you are an unbeliever. If, on the other hand, you say, ‘I do love God,’ your actions contradict you.

For a politics of emancipation, the enemy that is to be feared most is not repression at the hands of the established order. It is the interiority of nihilism, and the unbounded cruelty that can come with its emptiness.

You reach out your hand, but you’re all alone, in those time passages.