It is a thousand times better to have common sense without education than to have education without common sense.

The savage prays to a stone that he calls a god, while the Christian prays to a god he calls a spirit, and the prayers of both are equally useful.

Laughing has always been considered by theologians as a crime.

Where is the soul? . . . I refuse to believe anything of that kind without proof. The idea that, as soon as a man's breath leaves his body, the soul flops out like a chicken's head and flies off into space to find a lodgment where there [are] harps and haloes. Too much for me.

If I owe Smith ten dollars and God forgives me, that doesn't pay Smith.

I would have all the professors in colleges, all the teachers in schools of every kind, including those in Sunday schools, agree that they would teach only what they know, that they would not palm off guesses as demonstrated truths.

They knew no better, but I do not propose to follow the example of a barbarian because he was honestly a barbarian.