The furnace of affliction refines us from earthly drossiness, and softens us for the impression of God's own stamp.

It has been asserted, that a moral Atheist would be a monster beyond the power of nature to create: I reply, that it is not more strange for an Atheist to live virtuously, than for a Christian to abandon himself to crime! If we believe the last kind of monster, why dispute the existence of the first?

It is pure illusion to think that an opinion which passes down from century to century, from generation to generation, may not be entirely false.

It is only common prejudice that induces us to believe that atheism is a fearful state.

I know too much to be a sceptic and too little to be a dogmatist.

The furnace of affliction refines us from earthly drossiness, and softens us for the impression of God's own stamp.

The movement of comets is part of the ordinary works of nature which, without regard to the happiness or misery of mankind, are transported from one part of the heavens to another by virtue of the general laws of motion.