I cannot follow you Christians; for you try to crawl through your life upon your knees, while I stride through mine on my feet.

Better a thousandfold abuse of free speech than denial of free speech.

There is a court to which I shall appeal: the court of public opinion.

No religion is suddenly rejected by any people; it is rather gradually outgrown. None sees a religion die; dead religions are like dead languages and obsolete customs: the decay is long and - like the glacier march - is perceptible only to the careful watcher by comparisons extending over long periods.

Atheist, without God, I look to humankind for sympathy, for love, for hope, for effort, for aid.

I do not deny God, because that word conveys to me no idea, and I cannot deny that which presents to me no distinct affirmation, and of which the would-be affirmer has no conception. I cannot war with a nonentity. If, however, God is affirmed to represent an existence which is distinct from the existence of which I am a mode, and which it is alleged is not the noumenon of which the word I represents only a speciality of phenomena, then I deny God, and affirm that it is impossible God can be.

[That] my body be buried as cheaply as possible and no speeches be permitted at my funeral.