“Religious controversies are always productive of more acrimony and irreconcilable hatreds than those which spring from any other cause: And I was not without hopes that the enlightened and liberal policy of ⟨the present⟩ age would have put an effectual stop to contentions of this Kind.”
“Gouverneur Morris had often told me that General Washington believed no more of that system (Christianity) than did he himself.”
“The United States Constitutional Convention, except for three or four persons, thought prayers unnecessary.”
“Scarcely was I arrived at fifteen years of age, when, after having doubted in turn of different tenets, according as I found them combated in the different books that I read, I began to doubt of Revelation itself.”
Source: The Complete Works, in Philosophy, Politics, and Morals, of the Late Dr. Benjamin Franklin, Now First Collected and Arranged: With Memoirs of His Early Life
“Some volumes against Deism fell into my hands ... they produced an effect precisely the reverse to what was intended by the writers; for the arguments of the Deists, which were cited in order to be refuted, appeared to me much more forcibly than the refutation itself; in a word, I soon became a thorough Deist.”
Source: The works of the late Dr. Benjamin Franklin: consisting of his Life, written by himself. Together with humorous, moral and literary essays, chiefly in the manner of the Spectator. Among which are several not in any American edition
“Each of us is carving a stone, erecting a column, or cutting a piece of stained glass in the construction of something much bigger than ourselves.”
“Revealed religion has no weight with me.”
“Indeed, when religious people quarrel about religion, or hungry people quarrel about victuals, it looks as if they had not much of either among them.”
Source: The Works of Benjamin Franklin; Containing Several Political and Historical Tracts Not Included in Any Former Edition, and Many Letters, Official and Private, Not Hitherto Published; with Notes and a Life of the Author
“When a religion is good, I conceive it will support itself; and when it does not support itself, and God does not take care to support it so that its professors are obliged to call for help of the civil power, 'tis a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one.”
Source: The private correspondence of Benjamin Franklin, LL.D, F.R.S., &c. Minister Plenipontentiary from the United States of America at the court of France, and for the Treaty of Peace and Independence with Great Britain, &c. &c: comprising a series of letters on miscellaneous, literary, and political subjects written between the years 1753 and 1790, illustrating the memoirs of his public and private life, and developing the secret history of his political transactions and negociations
“Do not, however, mistake me. It is not to my good friend's heresy that I impute his honesty. On the contrary, 'tis his honesty that brought upon him the character of a heretic.”
Source: The Private Correspondence of Benjamin Franklin .. Comprising a Series of Letters on Miscellaneous, Litarary, and Political Subjects: Written Between the Years 1753 and 1790; Illustrating the Memoirs of His Public and Private Life, and Developing the Secret History of His Political Transactions and Negociations. Now First Published from the Originals