“It is, therefore, a just political maxim, that every man must be supposed a knave.”

To be a philosophical Sceptic is the first and most essential step towards being a sound, believing Christian.

The truth springs from arguments amongst friends.

When men are most sure and arrogant they are commonly most mistaken, giving views to passion without that proper deliberation which alone can secure them from the grossest absurdities.

Any pride or haughtiness, is displeasing to us, merely because it shocks our own pride, and leads us by sympathy into comparison, which causes the disagreeable passion of humility.

How can we satisfy ourselves without going on in infinitum? And, after all, what satisfaction is there in that infinite progression?

What a peculiar privilege has this little agitation of the brain which we call ‘thought’

It is an absurdity to believe that the Deity has human passions, and one of the lowest of human passions, a restless appetite for applause

Tis not unreasonable for me to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger.

The bigotry of theologians is a malady which seems almost incurable.

I weigh the one miracle against the other and according to the superiority which I discover, I pronounce my decision.

The science of man is the only solid foundation for the other sciences.

Carelessness and in-attention alone can afford us any remedy. For this reason I rely entirely upon them.

But the greatest part of mankind float between vice and virtue.

I never knew anyone, that examined and deliberated about nonsense, who did not believe it before the end of his enquiries.

Where am I, or what? From what causes do I derive my existence, and to what condition shall I return?

Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.

Spiritual power is the eternal guide, in this life and the life after, for man ranks supreme among all creatures. Led forward by spiritual power, man can reach the summit destined for him by the Great Creator.

An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made, in a narrow field.

The average man does not get pleasure out of an idea because he thinks it is true; he thinks it is true because he gets pleasure out of it.

But man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself.

A man who says “I have learned enough and will learn no further” should be considered as knowing nothing at all.

It was bad enough to have toppled from the Olympic heights to make my living competing with animals. But the competition wasn’t even fair. No man could beat a race horse, not even for 100 yards.

When I went to college, as much as my parents emphasized academic achievement, they emphasized marriage even more. They told me that the most eligible women marry young to get a ‘good man’ before they are all taken.

A truly equal world would be one where women ran half our countries and companies and men ran half our homes.