An agnostic would be the more correct description of my state of mind.

When the sexes differ in beauty, in the power of singing, or in producing what I have called instrumental music, it is almost invariably the male which excels the female.

A mathematician is a blind man in a dark room looking for a black cat which isn't there.

With highly civilised nations continued progress depends in a subordinate degree on natural selection; for such nations do not supplant and exterminate one another as do savage tribes.

...I believe there exists, & I feel within me, an instinct for the truth, or knowledge or discovery, of something of the same nature as the instinct of virtue, & that our having such an instinct is reason enough for scientific researches without any practical results ever ensuing from them.

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge.

It may be conceit, but I believe the subject will interest the public, and I am sure that the views are original.