Despite the enormous quantity of books, how few people read! And if one reads profitably, one would realize how much stupid stuff the vulgar herd is content to swallow every day.

In all the disputes which have excited Christians against each other, Rome has invariably decided in favor of that opinion which tended most towards the suppression of the human intellect and the annihilation of the reasoning powers.

God is a circle whose center is everywhere and circumference nowhere.

What will the preachers say? .. to teach men not to persecute men: for, while a few sanctimonious humbugs are burning a few fanatics, the earth opens and swallows up all alike.

It is the characteristic of the most stringent censorships that they give credibility to the opinions they attack.

The true triumph of reason is that it enables us to get along with those who do not possess it.

All pleasantry should be short; and it might even be as well were the serious short also.