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No man of sense in the whole world believes in devils any more than he does in mermaids, vampires, gorgons, hydras, naiads, dryads, nymphs, fairies, the Fountain of Youth, [or] the Philosopher's Stone. . . .

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
Doe
Fairy
Nymphs
Whole
Stone
Mermaid
Philosopher
Fairies
Believe
Stones
Devils
Men
Devil
Vampires
World
Youth
Fountain
Religion
Vampire
Mermaids
Sense
Believes
Hydra

More quotes by Robert Green Ingersoll

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We do not need the forgiveness of God, but of each other and of ourselves.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Millions of men give all their energies, as well as their very souls, for the acquisition of gold. And this will continue as long as society is ignorant enough and hypocritical enough to hold in high esteem the man of wealth without the slightest regard to the character of the man.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Talent has the four seasons: spring, that is to say, the sowing of the seeds summer, growth autumn, the harvest winter, intellectual death. But there is now and then a genius who has no winter, and, no matter how many years he may live, on the blossom of his thought no snow falls. Genius has the climate of perpetual growth.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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As a matter of fact, no one knows that God exists and no one knows that God does not exist. To my mind there is no evidence that God exists - that this world is governed by a being of infinite goodness, wisdom and power, but I do not pretend to know.
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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Argument cannot be answered with insults. Kindness is strength anger blows out the lamp of the mind.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Commerce is the great civilizer.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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An infinite God ought to be able to protect Himself, without going in partnership with State Legislatures.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Reason, observation, and experience the holy trinity of science.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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If all the historic books of the Bible were blotted from the memory of mankind, nothing of value would be lost.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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I believe that there is something far nobler than loyalty to any particular man. Loyalty to the truth as we perceive it - loyalty to our duty as we know it - loyalty to the ideals of our brain and heart - is, to my mind, far greater and far nobler than loyalty to the life of any particular man or God. . . .
Robert Green Ingersoll
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It is told that the great Angelo, in decorating a church, painted some angels wearing sandals. A cardinal looking at the picture said to the artist: Whoever saw angels with sandals? Angelo answered with another question: Whoever saw an angel barefooted?
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Only those who live on the labor of the ignorant are the enemies of science. Real love and real religion are in no danger from science. The more we know the safer all good things are.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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One laugh of a child will make the holiest day more sacred still.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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In all ages, hypocrites, called priests, have put crowns upon the heads of thieves, called kings.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Commerce is the great civilizer. We exchange ideas when we exchange fabrics.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Labor is the only prayer that Nature answers: It is the only prayer that deserves an answer—good, honest, noble work.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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One thing I do know, and that is, that neither hope, nor fear, belief, nor denial, can change the fact. It is as it is, and it will be as it must be.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Age after age, the strong have trampled upon the weak the crafty and heartless have ensnared and enslaved the simple and innocent, and nowhere, in all the annals of mankind, has any god succored the oppressed
Robert Green Ingersoll
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On every hand there seems to be design to defeat design. If God created man - if he is the father of us all, why did he make the criminals, the insane, the deformed and idiotic? Should the mother, who clasps to her breast an idiot child, thank God?
Robert Green Ingersoll