Quotessence
Home / Topics / Abracadabra Quotes

Abracadabra Quotes

Browse 14 quotes about Abracadabra.

Abracadabra Quotes

“Altho' I rarely waste time in reading on theological subjects, as mangled by our Pseudo-Christians, yet I can readily suppose Basanistos may be amusing. Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus. If it could be understood it would not answer their purpose. Their security is in their faculty of shedding darkness, like the scuttlefish, thro' the element in which they move, and making it impenetrable to the eye of a pursuing enemy, and there they will skulk. [Letter to Francis Adrian Van der Kemp on 30 July 1810 denouncing the Christian doctrine of the Trinity]”

PriestsRidiculeSuperstitionTrinityWeaponChristiansAbracadabraThe Trinity
Book:Letters of Thomas Jefferson
Create image

“Whether the pressure is from an inward or an outward expectation, there's always this nagging feeling that we should be able to restore any form of disfigurement, that embalmers should possess some Harry Potter magic in our prep room and magically wave our trocar (a large needle-like instrument we use during embalming) while chanting Abracadabra, pulchra cadaver and then "poof we have beautiful corpses. But there is no magic trocar.”

Harry PotterAbracadabraEmbalmber
Book:Confessions of a Funeral Director: How the Business of Death Saved My Life
Create image

“Ridicule is the only weapon which can be used against unintelligible propositions. Ideas must be distinct before reason can act upon them; and no man ever had a distinct idea of the trinity. It is the mere Abracadabra of the mountebanks calling themselves the priests of Jesus.”

MenIdeasReasonUsedReligionJesusAtheismCallingWeaponsMerePriestsPropositionsRidiculeTrinityAgainst ReligionGod DelusionAnti AtheistAbracadabra
Book:The Jefferson Bible: With the Annotated Commentaries on Religion of Thomas Jefferson
Create image

“In order that the relations between science and the age may be what they ought to be, the world at large must be made to feel that science is, in the fullest sense, a ministry of good to all, not the private possession and luxury of a few, that it is the best expression of human intelligence and not the abracadabra of a school, that it is a guiding light and not a dazzling fog.”

WorldFeelsHumansMayMadeLightAgeSchoolScienceOrderExpressionOughtAccountsRelationIntelligentPossessionLuxuryMinistryFogDazzlingHuman IntelligenceGuiding LightAbracadabra
Author:William Jay Youmans
Create image

“Kids use words in ways that release hidden meanings, revel the history buried in sounds. They haven't forgotten that words can be more than signs, that words have magic, the power to be things, to point to themselves and materialize. With their back-formations, archaisms, their tendency to play the music in words--rhythm, rhyme, alliteration, repetition--children peel the skin from language. Words become incantatory. Open Sesame. Abracadabra. Perhaps a child will remember the word and will bring the walls tumbling down.”

WayChildrenPlayUseKidsRememberLanguageSoundMagicHavensWallSkinsForgottenTendenciesRhythmReleaseBuriedRhymeRepetitionFormationTumblingHidden MeaningLanguage WordsAlliterationTumbling DownAbracadabra
Author:John Edgar Wideman
Create image

“Abracadabra, thus we learn The more you create, the less you earn. The less you earn, the more you're given, The less you lead, the more you're driven, The more destroyed, the more they feed, The more you pay, the more they need, The more you earn, the less you keep, And now I lay me down to sleep. I pray the Lord my soul to take If the tax-collector hasn't got it before I wake.”

IfsNeedsSoulPoliticsGivenSleepPayLordPrayingTaxesLaysDrivenDestroyedMy SoulI PrayCollectorsAbracadabra
Book:The face is familiar: the selected verse of Ogden Nash
Create image