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We can be as honest as we are ignorant. If we are, when asked what is beyond the horizon of the known, we must say that we do not know.

Robert Green Ingersoll

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Robert Green Ingersoll
Age: 65 †
Born: 1833
Born: August 11
Died: 1899
Died: July 21
Essayist
Lawyer
Lecturer
Orator
Philosopher
Politician
Writer
Dresden
Yates County
New York
Robert Ingersoll
The Great Agnostic
Known
Must
Horizon
Ignorant
Asked
Beyond
Honest

More quotes by Robert Green Ingersoll

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Superstition is, always has been, and forever will be, the foe of progress, the enemy of education and the assassin of freedom.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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By physical liberty I mean the right to do anything which does not interfere with the happiness of another. By intellectual liberty I mean the right to think and the right to think wrong.
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We are all children of the same mother, and the same fate awaits us all. We, too, have our religion, and it is this: Help for the living-Hope for the dead.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The man who finds a truth lights a torch.
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Great virtues may draw attention from defects, they cannot sanctify them. A pebble surrounded by diamonds remains a common stone, and a diamond surrounded by pebbles is still a gem.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Life is a narrow vale between the cold and barren peaks of two eternities. We strive in vain to look beyond the heights. We cry aloud
Robert Green Ingersoll
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If the money is raised by taxation, then the burden will fall where it ought to fall, . . . and the rich and stingy will no longer be able to evade the duties of citizenship and of humanity.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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And why does this same God tell me how to raise my children when he had to drown his?
Robert Green Ingersoll
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You cannot be so poor that you cannot help somebody.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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It is better to deserve without receiving than to receive without deserving
Robert Green Ingersoll
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He raised his hands, not to strike, but in benediction. Lincoln was the grandest figure of the fiercest civil war. He is the gentlest memory of our world.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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I do not see how it is possible for an intelligent human being to conclude that the Song of Solomon is the work of God, and that the tragedy of Lear was the work of an uninspired man.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Liberty is the condition of progress. Without Liberty, there remains only barbarism. Without Liberty, there can be no civilization.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Intellect, without heart, is infinitely cruel. . . . So that, after all, the real aristocracy must be that of goodness where the intellect is directed by the heart.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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You see, after all, few rich men own their property. The property owns them.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Blasphemy is an epithet bestowed by superstition upon common sense.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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When a fact can be demonstrated, force is unnecessary when it cannot be demonstrated, force is infamous.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The man who accepts opinions because they have been entertained by distinguished people, is a mental snob.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The minister asks, 'What right have you to hope? It is sacrilegious to you.' But, whether the clergy like it or not, I shall always express my real opinion, and shall always be glad to say to those who mourn: 'There is in death, as I believe, nothing worse than sleep. Hope for as much better as you can.'
Robert Green Ingersoll
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An honest god is the noblest work of man. ... God has always resembled his creators. He hated and loved what they hated and loved and he was invariably found on the side of those in power. ... Most of the gods were pleased with sacrifice, and the smell of innocent blood has ever been considered a divine perfume.
Robert Green Ingersoll