Of learned men, the clergy show the lowest development of professional ethics. Any pastor is free to cadge customers from the divines of rival sects, and to denounce the divines themselves as theological quacks.

What I got in Sunday school ... was simply a firm conviction that the Christian faith was full of palpable absurdities, and the Christian God preposterous.... The act of worship, as carried on by Christians, seems to me to be debasing rather than ennobling. It involves groveling before a being who, if he really exists, deserves to be denounced instead of respected.

Pastor: One employed by the wicked to prove to them by his example that virtue doesn't pay.

The curse of man, and the cause of nearly all his woe, is his stupendous capacity for believing the incredible.

There comes a day of public ceremonial, and a chance to make a speech.... A million voters with IQs below 60 have their ears glued to the radio. It takes four days' hard work to concoct a speech without a sensible word in it. Next a dam must be opened somewhere. Four dry Senators get drunk and make a painful scene. The Presidential automobile runs over a dog. It rains.

A gentlemen is one who never strikes a woman without provocation.

The Christian always swears a bloody oath that he will never do it again. The civilized man simply resolves to be a bit more careful next time.