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Commerce makes friends, religion makes enemies the one enriches, and the other impoverishes the one thrives best where the truth is told, the other where falsehoods are believed.

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
Believed
Impoverishes
Told
Falsehoods
Enemy
Enriches
Friends
Thrives
Religion
Falsehood
Makes
Commerce
Truth
Thrive
Best
Enemies

More quotes by Robert Green Ingersoll

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I am not so much for the freedom of religion as I am for the religion of freedom.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Music was born of love. Had there never been any human affection, there never could have been uttered a strain of music.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Is there an intelligent man or woman now in the world who believes in the Garden of Eden story? If you find any man who believes it, strike his forehead and you will hear an echo. Something is for rent.
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Custom meets us at the cradle and leaves us only at the tomb.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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It is with men as with other things. The mullein needs only a year, but the oak a century, and the greatest men are those who have continued to grow as long as they have lived.
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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Intellect, without heart, is infinitely cruel. . . .
Robert Green Ingersoll
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I would rather live with the woman I love in a world full of trouble, than to live in heaven with nobody but men.
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The Christians say, that among the ancient Jews, if you committed a crime you had to kill a sheep. Now they say 'charge it.' 'Put it on the slate.' The Savior will pay it. In this way, rascality is sold on credit, and the credit system in morals, as in business, breeds extravagance.
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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As more people become more intelligent they care less for preachers and more for teachers.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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I am simply in favor of intellectual hospitality-that is all. You come to me with a new idea. I invite you into the house. Let us see what you have. Let us talk it over. If I do not like your thought, I will bid it a polite good day. If I do like it, I will say: Sit down stay with me, and become a part of the intellectual wealth of my world.
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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The superior man is the providence of the inferior. He is eyes for the blind, strength for the weak, and a shield for the defenseless. He stands erect by bending above the fallen. He rises by lifting others.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The church teaches us that we can make God happy by being miserable ourselves.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Happiness is not a reward - it is a consequence. Suffering is not a punishment - it is a result.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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The clergy know that I know that they know that they do not know.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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Only a few years ago there was no person too ignorant to successfully answer Charles Darwin and the more ignorant he was the more cheerfully he undertook the task.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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If we are immortal, it is a fact of nature, and that fact does not depend on bibles, on Christs, priest, or creeds.
Robert Green Ingersoll
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If nobody has too much, everybody will have enough.
Robert Green Ingersoll