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Quote by Frances Wright

“... we have broken down the self-respecting spirit of man with nursery tales and priestly threats, and we dare to assert, that inproportion as we have prostrated our understanding and degraded our nature, we have exhibited virtue, wisdom, and happiness, in our words, our actions, and our lives!”

Book:Course of popular lectures as delivered by Frances Wright: with three addresses on various public occasions, and a reply to the charges against the French reformers of 1789. Second edition

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Frances Wright, an influential figure of her time, delivers a series of lectures and addresses in this book. These lectures cover a range of public issues and are accompanied by a detailed response to the charges leveled against the French reformers of 1789. The second edition of the book offers a revised and updated version of Wright's original work. more

Author

Frances Wright

Frances Wright was an American writer and social reformer, born on September 6, 1795, and died on December 13, 1852. She is known for her advocacy of women's rights, abolition of slavery, and socialist ideas. more

“... the yearly expenses of the existing religious systemexceed in these United States twenty millions of dollars. Twenty millions! For teaching what? Things unseen and causes unknown!... Twenty millions would more than suffice to make us wise; and alas! do they not more than suffice to make us foolish?”

States Religion Causes Religious United Education Millions United States Wise Teaching Twenties Dollars Foolish Expenses Foolishness Unseen Alas

Author:Frances Wright

“... so far from entrenching human conduct within the gentle barriers of peace and love, religion has ever been, and now is, the deepest source of contentions, wars, persecutions for conscience sake, angry words, angry feelings, backbitings, slanders, suspicions, false judgments, evil interpretations, unwise, unjust, injurious, inconsistent actions.”

Source: Course of popular lectures as delivered by Frances Wright: with three addresses on various public occasions, and a reply to the charges against the French reformers of 1789. Second edition

“... your spiritual teachers caution you against enquiry--tell you not to read certain books; not to listen to certain people; to beware of profane learning; to submit your reason, and to receive their doctrines for truths. Such advice renders them suspicious counsellors.”

Source: Course of popular lectures; with 3 addresses on various public occasions, and a reply to the charges against the French reformers of 1789

“Knowledge signifies things known. Where there are no things known, there is no knowledge. Where there are no things to be known, there can be no knowledge. We have observed that every science, that is, every branch of knowledge, is compounded of certain facts, of which our sensations furnish the evidence. Where no such evidence is supplied, we are without data; we are without first premises; and when, without these, we attempt to build up a science, we do as those who raise edifices without foundations. And what do such builders construct? Castles in the air.”

Firsts Facts Science Certain Religion Known Knowledge Air Evidence Raises Foundation Data Branches Sensations Constructs Castles Premises Builder Edifice Castles In The Air

Author:Frances Wright

“... the happiness of a people is the only rational object of government, and the only object for which a people, free to choose, can have a government at all.”

People Government Happiness Objects Rational

Book:Course of popular lectures; with 3 addresses on various public occasions, and a reply to the charges against the French reformers of 1789

Source: Course of popular lectures; with 3 addresses on various public occasions, and a reply to the charges against the French reformers of 1789

“So long as the mental and moral instruction of man is left solely in the hands of hired servants of the public--let them be teachers of religion, professors of colleges, authors of books, or editors of journals or periodical publications, dependent upon their literary incomes for their daily bread, so long shall we hear but half the truth; and well if we hear so much. Our teachers, political, scientific, moral, or religious; our writers, grave or gay, are compelled to administer to our prejudices and to perpetuate our ignorance.”

“Today three-quarters of the Palestinian people are displaced: there are 5 million Palestinian refugees throughout the world.”

People World Today Three Millions Quarters Palestinian Refugee Palestinian Refugees

Author:Ismail Haniyeh

“The best road to correct reasoning is by physical science; the way to trace effects to causes is through physical science; the only corrective, therefore, of superstition is physical science.”

Way Reason Science Causes Effects Reasoning Superstitions Physical Science

Book:Course of popular lectures

Source: Course of popular lectures

“... a nation to be strong, must be united; to be united, must be equal in condition; to be equal in condition, must be similar inhabits and feeling; to be similar in habits and feeling, must be raised in national institutions as the children of a common family, and citizens of a common country.”

Children Country Feelings Strong Nations United Common Conditions Habit Citizens Equal Institutions Unity Raised Equality Assimilation

Author:Frances Wright

“To give liberty to a slave before he understands its value is, perhaps, rather to impose a penalty than to bestow a blessing.”

Giving Values Freedom Liberty Blessing Slavery Slave Penalties

Book:Views of society and manners in America: in a series of letters from that country to a friend in England, during the years 1818, 1819, and 1820

Source: Views of society and manners in America: in a series of letters from that country to a friend in England, during the years 1818, 1819, and 1820

Quote by Frances Wright

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