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Quote by Edwin Gaustad

“Most of the founding fathers, sympathetic with and influenced by the European Enlightenment, saw religion - natural religion, that is - as a potential good, but with equal clarity they saw the religions of existing institutions and religions based on a fixed scriptural revelation as meddlesome, wrong-headed and hopelessly obsolete.”

Quote by Edwin Gaustad

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Edwin Gaustad
Edwin Gaustad

Edwin Gaustad was an individual of an unknown profession, born on November 14, 1923, and passed away on March 25, 2011. more

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“In America, religious dissent is as vital as it is elusive. Like the secretions of the pituitary, the juices of dissent are essential to ongoing life even if we do not always know precisely how, when or where they perform their tasks, and the not knowing - the flimsy, filmy elusiveness - is supremely characteristic of America's expressions of religious dissent. For in the United States no stalwart orthodoxy stands ever ready to parry the sharp thrust or clever feints of dissent.”

IfsKnowsStatesAmericaReligiousUnitedUnited StatesKnowingAtheismReadyExpressionEssentialsTasksCleverCharacteristicsNot KnowingJuiceOngoingDissentThrustOrthodoxyElusiveStalwartElusiveness
Author:Edwin Gaustad
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“A state of skepticism and suspense may amuse a few inquisitive minds. But the practice of superstition is so congenial to the multitude that, if they are forcibly awakened, they still regret the loss of their pleasing vision.”

IfsMindMayStillsStatesLossVisionPracticeAtheismRegretPositive AtheismSuspenseSuperstitionsSkepticismMultitudesAwakenedInquisitiveInquisitive Minds
Book:The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire
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“The stony-minded orthodox were right in fearing the first movement of new knowledge and free thought. It has gone on, and will go on, irresistibly, until some day we shall have no respect for an alleged "truth" which cannot stand the full blaze of knowledge, the full force of active thought.”

FirstsForceGoneAtheismMovementGoes OnPositive AtheismActiveOrthodoxNo RespectFree ThoughtNew Knowledge
Book:The Living of Charlotte Perkins Gilman: An Autobiography
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“The soaring, imaginative minds of men, constructing lofty, shimmering piles of abstract thought, and taking as their postulate a revelation from God, gaveus relgions which coule not possible maintained without belief and obedience: ... we find them most permanent and changeless among people who make the least effort to swquare their beliefs with the laws of life.”

PeopleMenMindLawBeliefEffortAtheismPositive AtheismObediencePermanentAbstractRevelationsSoarImaginativeLoftyLaws Of Life
Author:Charlotte Perkins Gilman
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“If we once admit that our life is here for the purpose of race-improvement, then we question any religion which does not improve the race, or the main force of which evaporates, as it were, directing our best efforts toward the sky.... Improvement in the human race is not accomplished by extracting any number of souls and placing them in heaven, or elsewhere. It must be established on earth, either through achievement in social service, or through better children.”

IfsHumansChildrenDoeSoulEarthLife IsPurposeForceHeavenSocialNumbersEffortRaceOur LivesSkyAtheismAchievementPositive AtheismImprovementHuman RaceAccomplishedElsewhereBest EffortSocial Service
Author:Charlotte Perkins Gilman
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