“Is it not a species of blasphemy to call the New Testament revealed religion, when we see in it such contradictions and absurdities.”
Source: An examination of the passages in the New Testament quoted from the Old and called prophecies concerning Jesus Christ. To which is prefixed, An essay on dreams. Also an appendix
“Time makes more converts than reason.”
Source: Citizen Paine: Thomas Paine's Thoughts on Man, Government, Society, and Religion
“The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is reason.”
Source: The Age of Reason: Being an Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology
“He that rebels against reason is a real rebel, but he that in defence of reason rebels against tyranny has a better title to Defender of the Faith, than George the Third.”
Source: THOMAS PAINE Ultimate Collection: Political Works, Philosophical Writings, Speeches, Letters & Biography (Including Common Sense, The Rights of Man & The Age of Reason): The American Crisis, The Constitution of 1795, Declaration of Rights, Agrarian Justice, The Republican Proclamation, Anti-Monarchal Essay, Letters to Thomas Jefferson and George Washington…
“We can only reason from what is; we can reason on actualities, but not on possibilities.”
“But such is the irresistable nature of truth, that all it asks, and all it wants is the liberty of appearing.”
Source: Paine: Political Writings
“Suspicion is the companion of mean souls, and the bane of all good society.”
Source: Citizen Paine: Thomas Paine's Thoughts on Man, Government, Society, and Religion
“The Vatican is a dagger in the heart of Italy.”
“When we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not hereditary.”
Source: Common Sense: and The American Crisis I
“Human nature is not of itself vicious.”
Source: The Thomas Paine Collection: Common Sense, Rights of Man, Age of Reason, An Essay on Dream, Biblical Blasphemy, Examination Of The Prophecies
“Virtues are acquired through endeavor, Which rests wholly upon yourself. So, to praise others for their virtues Can but encourage one's own efforts.”
“It is the direction and not the magnitude which is to be taken into consideration.”
“Titles are but nicknames, and every nickname is a title.”
Source: THE RIGHTS OF MAN: The French Revolution – Ideals, Arguments & Motives (Political Classic): Being an Answer to Mr. Burke's Attack on the French Revolution
“War involves in its progress such a train of unforeseen circumstances that no human wisdom can calculate the end; it has but one thing certain, and that is to increase taxes.”
“There are matters in the Bible, said to be done by the express commandment of God, that are shocking to humanity and to every idea we have of moral justice.”
“It is not a field of a few acres of ground, but a cause, that we are defending, and whether we defeat the enemy in one battle, or by degrees, the consequences will be the same.”
Source: THOMAS PAINE Ultimate Collection: Political Works, Philosophical Writings, Speeches, Letters & Biography (Including Common Sense, The Rights of Man & The Age of Reason): The American Crisis, The Constitution of 1795, Declaration of Rights, Agrarian Justice, The Republican Proclamation, Anti-Monarchal Essay, Letters to Thomas Jefferson and George Washington…
“'Tis the business of little minds to shrink; but he whose heart is firm, and whose conscience approves his conduct, will pursue his principles unto death.”
Source: Citizen Paine: Thomas Paine's Thoughts on Man, Government, Society, and Religion
“To establish any mode to abolish war, however advantageous it might be to Nations, would be to take from such Government the most lucrative of its branches.”
Source: Rights of Man: Being an Answer to Mr. Burke's Attack on the French Revolution
“Every science has for its basis a system of principles as fixed and unalterable as those by which the universe is regulated and governed. Man cannot make principles; he can only discover them.”
“There are two distinct classes of what are called thoughts: those that we produce in ourselves by reflection and the act of thinking and those that bolt into the mind of their own accord.”
Source: The age of reason
“The abilities of man must fall short on one side or the other, like too scanty a blanket when you are abed. If you pull it upon your shoulders, your feet are left bare; if you thrust it down to your feet, your shoulders are uncovered.”
“The cause of America is in great measure the cause of all mankind.”
“Man did not enter society to be worse off, or to have fewer rights, but rather to have those rights better secured”
“Independence is my happiness, and I view things as they are, without regard to place or person; my country is the world, and my religion is to do good.”
Source: Rights of Man
“Some writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins ... Society is in every state a blessing, but Government, even in its best state, is but a necessary evil; in its worst state, an intolerable one.”
Source: Common Sense: and The American Crisis I
“To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead, or endeavoring to convert an atheist by scripture.”
Source: Common Sense, The Rights of Man and Other Essential Writings of ThomasPaine
“A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong, gives it a superficial appearance of being right, and raises at first a formidable outcry in defense of custom. But the tumult soon subsides. Time makes more converts than reason.”
Source: Annotated Common Sense with English Grammar Exercises: by Thomas Paine (Author), Robert Powell (Editor)
“Let a crown be placed thereon, by which the world may know, that so far as we approve of monarcy, that in America the law is King. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be King; and there ought to be no other.”
Source: Common Sense: and The American Crisis I
“To believe that God created a plurality of worlds, at least as numerous as what we call stars, renders the Christian faith at once little and ridiculous; and scatters it in the mind like feathers in the air.”
Source: THE AGE OF REASON - Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology (Including
“Better fare hard with good men than feast it with bad.”
“Society is produced by our wants, and government by wickedness; the former promotes our happiness positively by uniting our affections, the latter negatively by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher.”
Source: Common Sense: and The American Crisis I
“These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country; but he that stands it NOW, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.”
“What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated.”
“That there are men in all countries who get their living by war, and by keeping up the quarrels of Nations is as shocking as it is true.”
Source: THE AGE OF REASON - Investigation of True and Fabulous Theology (Including
“Small islands, not capable of protecting themselves, are the proper objects for kingdoms to take under their care; but there is something absurd, in supposing a continent to be perpetually governed by an island.”
Source: The Political Writings of Thomas Paine: To which is Prefixed a Brief Sketch of the Author's Life
“It was needless, after this, to say that all was vanity and vexation of spirit; for it is impossible to derive happiness from the company of those whom we deprive of happiness.”
Source: Collected Writings
“Mingling religion with politics may be disavowed and reprobated by every inhabitant of America.”
Source: Thomas Paine: Collected Writings: Common Sense / The American Crisis / Rights of: (Library of America #76)
“Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil; in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamity is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer.”
Source: Common Sense & The Rights of Man - The Voice of the American Revolution: Words of a Visionary That Sparked the Revolution and Remained the Core of American Democratic Principles
“Of all the systems of religion that ever were invented, there is no more derogatory to the Almighty, more unedifying to man, more repugnant to reason, and more contradictory to itself than this thing called Christianity. Too absurd for belief, too impossible to convince, and too inconsistent for practice, it renders the heart torpid or produces only atheists or fanatics. As an engine of power, it serves the purpose of despotism, and as a means of wealth, the avarice of priests, but so far as respects the good of man in general it leads to nothing here or hereafter.”
“The mind once enlightened cannot again become dark.”
Source: The Political Writings of Thomas Paine: Secretary to the Committee of Foreign Affairs in the American Revolution : to which is Prefixed a Brief Sketch of the Author's Life
“Could the peaceable principle of the Quakers be universally established, arms and the art of war would be wholly extirpated: But we live not in a world of angels...I am thus far a Quaker, that I would gladly agree with all the world to lay aside the use of arms, and settle matters by negotiation: but unless the whole will, the matter ends, and I take up my musket and thank Heaven He has put it in my power.”
“Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise.”
“To reason with goverments, as they have existed for ages, is to argue with brutes. It is only from the nations themselves that reforms can be expected”
Source: THOMAS PAINE Ultimate Collection: Political Works, Philosophical Writings, Speeches, Letters & Biography (Including Common Sense, The Rights of Man & The Age of Reason): The American Crisis, The Constitution of 1795, Declaration of Rights, Agrarian Justice, The Republican Proclamation, Anti-Monarchal Essay, Letters to Thomas Jefferson and George Washington…
“I have always strenuously supported the right of every man to his own opinion, however different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies to another this right, makes a slave of himself to his present opinion, because he precludes himself the right of changing it.”
Source: The Thomas Paine Collection: Common Sense, Rights of Man, Age of Reason, An Essay on Dream, Biblical Blasphemy, Examination Of The Prophecies
“All the tales of miracles, with which the Old and New Testament are filled, are fit only for impostors to preach and fools to believe.”
Source: The Theological Works of Thomas Paine: The Most Complete Edition Ever Published
“Is it more probable that nature should go out of her course, or that a man should tell a lie? We have never seen, in our time, nature go out of her course; but we have good reason to believe that millions of lies have been told in the same time.”
“For all men being originally equals, no one by birth could have the right to set up his own family in perpetual preference to all others forever, and tho' himself might deserve some decent degree of honours of his cotemporaries, yet his descendants might be far too unworthy to inherit them.”
Source: Common Sense: With the Whole Appendix: the Address to the Quakers: Also, the Large Additions
“I believe in one God, and no more; and I hope for happiness beyond this life. I believe in the equality of humans; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavoring to make our fellow creatures happy.”
“I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My own mind is my own church.”
Source: The Theological Works of Thomas Paine
“Infidelity does not consist in believing, or in disbelieving; it consists in professing to believe what he does not believe. It is impossible to calculate the moral mischief, if I may so express it, that mental lying has produced in society. When a man has so far corrupted and prostituted the chastity of his mind, as to subscribe his professional belief to things he does not believe, he has prepared himself for the commission of every other crime.”
Source: The Thomas Paine Collection: Common Sense, Rights of Man, Age of Reason, An Essay on Dream, Biblical Blasphemy, Examination Of The Prophecies
