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When passions and appetites are stronger than the intellect, men are savages when the intellect governs the passions, when the passions are servants, men are civilized. The people need education - facts - philosophy.

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
Men
Stronger
Governs
People
Emotion
Servants
Philosophy
Savages
Education
Appetite
Passion
Passions
Facts
Civilized
Need
Servant
Needs
Intellect
Appetites

More quotes by Robert Green Ingersoll

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The intellectual advancement of man depends on how often he can exchange an old superstition for a new truth.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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If the Bible is true, it needs no inspiration, and - if not true, inspiration can do it no good.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The closer I'm bound in love to you, the closer I am to free.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Belief is not a matter of choice, but of conviction.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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I hate above all things a cross man. What right has he to murder the sunshine of a day? What right has he to assassinate the Joy of life? When you go home, you ought to go like a ray of light-so that it will, even in the night, burst out of the doors and windows and illuminate the darkness.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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With soap, baptism is a good thing.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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I will not attack your doctrines nor your creeds if they accord liberty to me. If they hold thought to be dangerous - if they aver that doubt is a crime, then I attack them one and all, because they enslave the minds of men.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The ministers, who preached at these revivals, were in earnest. They were zealous and sincere. They were not philosophers. To them science was the name of a vague dread - a dangerous enemy. They did not know much, but they believed a great deal.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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I do not believe in loving enemies I have pretty hard work to love my friends. Neither do I believe in revenge. No man can afford to keep the viper of revenge in his heart. But I believe in justice, in self-defense.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The idea that there is a God who rewards and punishes, and who can reward, if he so wishes, the meanest and vilest of the human race, so that he will be eternally happy, and can punish the best of the human race, so that he will be eternally miserable, is subversive of all morality.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Hope is the only universal liar who never loses his reputation for veracity.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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For myself, I have but little confidence in any business, or enterprise, or investment, that promises dividends only after the death of the stockholders.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Sacred are the lips from which has issued only truth.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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In the republic of mediocrity, genius is dangerous.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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And yet this same Deity says to me, resist not evil pray for those that despitefully use you love your enemies, but I will eternally damn mine. It seems to me that even gods should practice what they preach.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Do not trust those in whom the compulsion to punish is strong.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The record of a generous life runs like a vine around the memory of our dead, and every sweet unselfish act is now a perfumed flower.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The glory of science is, that it is freeing the soul, breaking the mental manacles, getting the brain out of bondage, giving courage to thought, filling the world with mercy, justice, and joy.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Commerce is the great civilizer.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Christianity did not come with tidings of great joy, but with a message of eternal grief. It came with the threat of everlasting torture on its lips. It meant war on earth and perdition hereafter.
Robert Green Ingersoll