3418 "To build one house for man is better than to build a dozen houses to God." [Lemuel K. Washburn, _Is The Bible Worth Reading And Other Essays_]

3207 "All through the centuries scholars and scientists have been imprisoned, tortured and burned alive for some discovery which seemed to conflict with a petty text of Scripture. Surely the immutable laws of the universe can teach more impressive and exalted lessons than the holy books of all the religions on earth." [Elizabeth Cady Stanton, The Woman's Bible Part 2. (From Great Infidels pg. 143.)]

3692 "I long for the commercialized Christmas of the 1970s. It's got so religious now, it's lost its true meaning."

2567 "...two devils rose from the water, and flew off through the air, crying, 'Oh, oh, oh!' and turning one over another, in sportive mockery...." [Martin Luther]

1725 "All Bibles are man-made." [Thomas Edison]

2241 "I honestly believe that the doctrine of hell was born in the glittering eyes of snakes that run in frightful coils watching for their prey. I believe it was born with the yelping, howling, growling and snarling of wild beasts... I despise it, I defy it, and I hate it." [Robert G. Ingersoll]

3467 "When men are hungry roast mutton is better than the lamb that taketh away wrath." [Lemuel K. Washburn, _Is The Bible Worth Reading And Other Essays_, 1911]

3414 "The original sin was not in eating of the forbidden fruit, but in planting the tree that bore the fruit." [Lemuel K. Washburn, _Is The Bible Worth Reading And Other Essays_]

2010 "Man created God, not God, man" [Guiseppi Garibaldi]

2487 "Fear was the first thing on earth to make gods." [Lucretius (96?-55 B.C.)]

3402 "Priest and God have formed some of the worst combinations in history." [Lemuel K. Washburn, _Is The Bible Worth Reading And Other Essays_]

1604 "I do not think it is possible to prove that belief in God is irrational. Zealous atheists may be disappointed in this, but there is no reason they should be. It is not the belief in God per se that is so offensive to the secular spirit. After all, Voltaire, Thomas Jefferson, and Tom Paine retained belief in a supreme Creator/Lawgiver. What rightly offends secular humanists is the bigotry, obscurantism, prudery, and persecuting zeal that all too often accompany theistic belief, especially in its particular institutional manifestations." Keith M. Parsons, God and the Burden of Proof, p. 145.

1534 "'But if oxen (and horses) and lions.... could draw with hands and create works of art like those made by men, horses would draw pictures of gods like horses, and oxen of gods like oxen.... Aethiopians have gods with snub noses and black hair, Thracians have gods with grey eyes and red hair.' Like many later critics of anthropomorphism, Xenophanes evidently did not question the gods themselves but only their human attributes. Later Western writers think the Greek gods especially anthropomorphic, but gods in many other religions are equally so." Stewart Guthrie, Faces in the Clouds: A New Theory of Religion (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), p. 178.

3395 "No creed can be stretched to the size of truth; no church can be made as large as man." [Lemuel K. Washburn, _Is The Bible Worth Reading And Other Essays_]

854 "Atheism is not a belief in the same sense that astigmatism, rheumatism, and botulism are not beliefs."

2630 "There is, in fact, no reason to believe that any given natural phenomenon, however marvelous it may seem today, will remain forever inexplicable. Soon or later the laws governing the production of life itself will be discovered in the laboratory, and man may set up business as a creator on his own account. The thing, indeed, is not only conceivable; it is even highly probable." [H. L. Mencken, 1930]

3649 "The right do do something does not mean that doing it is right." --William Safire

2719 "I viewed my fellow man not as a fallen angel, but as a risen ape" [Desmond Morris, "The Naked Ape"]

831 "There are some truths, however, that we should never forget: Superstition has always been the relentless enemy of science; faith has been a hater of demonstration; hypocrisy has been sincere only in its dread of truth, and all religions are inconsistent with mental freedom." -- R.G. Ingersoll

3296 "One of the proofs of the immortality of the soul is that myriads have believed it - they also believed the world was flat." [Mark Twain]