Robert Green Ingersoll Quotes & Sayings

Homes make patriots. He who has sat by his own fireside with wife and children will defend it. Few men have been patriotic enough to shoulder a musket in defense of a boarding house. The prosperity and glory of our country depend upon the number of people who are the owners of homes. — Robert Green Ingersoll

When you go home, fill the house with joy so that the light of it will stream out the windows and doors and illuminate even the darkness. It is just as easy that way as any in the world. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I thank thee, Mother Nature, that thou hast put ingenuity enough in the brain of a child, when attacked by a brutal parent, to throw up a little breastwork in the shape of a lie. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Perjury is the basest and meanest and most cowardly of crimes. What can it do? Perjury can change the common air that we breathe into the axe of an executioner. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Religion is not theory - it is life. It is not intellectual conviction - it is divine humanity, and nothing else. — Robert Green Ingersoll

The inventor of the plow did more good than the maker of the first rosary - because, say what you will, plowing is better than praying. — Robert Green Ingersoll

It is a blessed thing that in every age some one has had the individuality enough and courage enough to stand by his own convictions. — Robert Green Ingersoll

They say: Belief is important. I say: No, actions are important. Judge by deed, not by creed. — Robert Green Ingersoll

The history of intellectual progress is written in the lives of infidels. — Robert Green Ingersoll

In the night of death, hope sees a star, and listening love can hear the rustle of a wing. — Robert Green Ingersoll

In order to appreciate a great man, we must know his surroundings. We must understand the scope of the drama in which he played - the part he acted - and we must also know his audience. — Robert Green Ingersoll

To me, the most obscene word in our language is celibacy. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I hope there is another life, for I would like to see how things come out in this world when I am dead. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Infidels in all ages have battled for the rights of man, and have at all times been the fearless advocates of liberty and justice. — Robert Green Ingersoll

As long as every question is answered by the word "God," scientific inquiry is simply impossible. — Robert Green Ingersoll

An infinite personality is an infinite impossibility. — Robert Green Ingersoll

A crime against god is a demonstrated impossibility. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I want it so that every minister will be not a parrot, not an owl sitting upon a dead limb of the tree of knowledge and hooting the hoots that have been hooted for eighteen hundred years. But I want it so that each one can be an investigator, a thinker; and I want to make his congregation grand enough so that they will not only allow him to think, but will demand that he shall think, and give to them the honest truth of his thought. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I would rather live and love where death is king than have eternal life where love is not. — Robert Green Ingersoll

It is impossible for me to conceive of a character more utterly detestable than that of the Hebrew god. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Whether there is another life or not, if there is any being who gave me this, I shall thank him from the bottom of my heart, because, upon the whole, my life has been a joy. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Logic is not satisfied with assertion. It cares nothing for the opinions of the great; nothing for the prejudices of the many, and least of all for the superstitions of the dead. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Colleges are places where pebbles are polished and diamonds are dimmed. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I believe that labor is a blessing. It never was and never will be a curse. It is a blessed thing to labor for ... the ones you love. It is a blessed thing to have an object in life - something to do - something to call into play your best thoughts, to develop your faculties and to make you a man. — Robert Green Ingersoll

All prayers die in the air which they uselessly agitate. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Spirituality for the most part is a mask worn by idleness, arrogance and greed. — Robert Green Ingersoll

If there is one subject in this world worthy of being discussed, worthy of being understood, it is the question of intellectual liberty. Without that, we are simply painted clay. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Truth is the mother of joy. Truth civilizes, ennobles and purifies. The grandest ambition that can enter the soul is to know the truth. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so. — Robert Green Ingersoll

They who gain applause and power by pandering to the mistakes, the prejudices and passions of the multitude are the enemies of liberty. — Robert Green Ingersoll

There are some truths, however, that we should never forget: Superstition has always been the relentless enemy of science; faith has been a hater of demonstration; hypocrisy has been sincere only in its dread of truth, and all religions are inconsistent with mental freedom. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I have little confidence in any enterprise or business or investment that promises dividends only after the death of the stockholders. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Ignorance is the soil in which belief in miracles grows. — Robert Green Ingersoll

If the reason I give is a good one, you will act upon it. If it is a bad one I cannot make it better by piling epithet upon epithet. There is no logic in abuse; there is no argument in an epithet. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Everyone should be taught the nobility of labor, the heroism and splendor of honest effort. As long as it is considered disgraceful to labor, or aristocratic not to labor, the world will be filled with idleness and crime, and with every possible moral deformity. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I am simply in favor of intellectual hospitality-that is all. You come to me with a new idea. I invite you into the house. Let us see what you have. Let us talk it over. If I do not like your thought, I will bid it a polite "good day." If I do like it, I will say: "Sit down; stay with me, and become a part of the intellectual wealth of my world." — Robert Green Ingersoll

If there be gods we cannot help them, but we can assist our fellow men. We cannot love the inconceivable, but we can love wife and child and friend. — Robert Green Ingersoll

The government, in my judgment, cannot create money; the government can give its note, like an individual, and the prospect of its being paid determines its value. — Robert Green Ingersoll

What is it that distinguishes you and me from the lower animals - from the beasts? More, I say, than anything else, human sympathy - human sympathy. — Robert Green Ingersoll

We are all children of the same mother, and the same fate awaits us all. We, too, have our religion, and it is this: Help for the living-Hope for the dead. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Eternal punishment must be eternal cruelty, and I do not see how any man, unless he has the brain of an idiot, or the heart of a wild beast, can believe in eternal punishment. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Abraham Lincoln was, in my judgment, in many respects, the grandest man ever President of the United States. Upon his monument these words should be written: "Here sleeps the only man in the history of the world who, having been clothed with almost absolute power, never abused it, except upon the side of mercy." — Robert Green Ingersoll

All religion is slavery. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Every child should be taught that useful work is worship and that intelligent labor is the highest form of prayer. — Robert Green Ingersoll

The old man has been long at the fair. He is acquainted with the jugglers at the booths. His curiosity has been satisfied. He no longer cares for the exceptional, the monstrous, the marvelous and deformed. He looks through and beyond the gilding, the glitter and gloss, not only of things, but of conduct, of manners, theories, religions and philosophies. He sees clearer. The light no longer shines in his eyes. — Robert Green Ingersoll

The Catholics have a Pope. Protestants laugh at them, and yet the Pope is capable of intellectual advancement. In addition to this, the Pope is mortal, and the church cannot be afflicted with the same idiot forever. The Protestants have a book for their Pope. The book cannot advance. Year after year, and century after century, the book remains as ignorant as ever. — Robert Green Ingersoll

All that is necessary, as it seems to me, to convince any reasonable person that the Bible is simply and purely of human invention - of barbarian invention - is to read it. Read it as you would any other book; think of it as you would of any other; get the bandage of reverence from your eyes; drive from your heart the phantom of fear; push from the throne of your brain the cowled form of superstition - then read the Holy Bible, and you will be amazed that you ever, for one moment, supposed a being of infinite wisdom, goodness and purity, to be the author of such ignorance and of such atrocity. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Ignorance is the worst form of slavery. (Paraphrased) — Robert Green Ingersoll

Kings had their clowns, the people their actors and musicians. Shakespeare was scheduled as a servant. It is thus that successful stupidity has always treated genius. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Liberty cannot be sacrificed for the sake of anything. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Grant others the same rights as you claim for yourself. — Robert Green Ingersoll

All the professors in all the religious colleges in this country rolled into one, would not equal Charles Darwin. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I found that the clergy did not understand their own book. — Robert Green Ingersoll

The great poets have sympathized with the people. They have uttered in all ages the human cry. Unbought by gold, unawed by power, they have lifted high the torch that illuminates the world. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Orthodox Christians have the habit of claiming all great men, all men who have held important positions, men of reputation, men of wealth. As soon as the funeral is over clergymen begin to relate imaginary conversations with the deceased, and in a very little while the great man is changed to a Christian - possibly to a saint. — Robert Green Ingersoll

No writer must be measured by a word or paragraph. He is to be measured by his work - by the tendency, not of one line, but by the tendency of all. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Every flower about a house certifies to the refinement of somebody. Every vine climbing and blossoming tells of love and joy — Robert Green Ingersoll

Religion has not civilized man, man has civilized religion. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Every library is an arsenal. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I say that no man can be greater than the man who bravely and heroically sacrifices his life for the good of others. No man can be greater than the one who meets death face to face, and yet will not shrink from what he believes to be his highest duty. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I can imagine no sweeter way to end one's life than in the quiet of the country, out of the mad race for money, place and power - far from the demands of business - out of the dusty highway where fools struggle and strive for the hollow praise of other fools. — Robert Green Ingersoll

If I go to heaven I want to take my reason with me. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I believe in the religion of reason
the gospel of this world; in the development of the mind, in the accumulation of intellectual wealth, to the end that man may free himself from superstitious fear, to the end that he may take advantage of the forces of nature to feed and clothe the world. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I believe in living for this world - that's my doctrine - to make everybody happy that you can. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I will live by the standard of reason, and if thinking in accordance with reason takes me to perdition, then I will go to hell with my reason rather than to heaven without it. — Robert Green Ingersoll

If abuses are destroyed, we must destroy them. If slaves are freed, we must free them. If new truths are discovered, we must discover them. If the naked are clothed; if the hungry are fed; if justice is done; if labor is rewarded; if superstition is driven from the mind; if the defenseless are protected and if the right finally triumphs, all must be the work of people. The grand victories of the future must be won by humanity, and by humanity alone. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Religion is one of the phases of thought through which the world is passing. — Robert Green Ingersoll

They say that when god was in Jerusalem he forgave his murderers, but now he will not forgive an honest man for differing with him on the subject of the Trinity. They say that God says to me, "Forgive your enemies." I say, "I do;" but he says, "I will damn mine." God should be consistent. If he wants me to forgive my enemies he should forgive his. I am asked to forgive enemies who can hurt me. God is only asked to forgive enemies who cannot hurt him. He certainly ought to be as generous as he asks us to be. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Every creed is a rock in running water: humanity sweeps by it. Every creed cries to the universe, "Halt!" A creed is the ignorant Past bulling the enlightened Present. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Years should not be devoted to the acquisition of dead languages or to the study of history which, for the most part, is a detailed account of things that never occurred. It is useless to fill the individual with dates of great battles, with the births and deaths of kings. They should be taught the philosophy of history, the growth of nations, of philosophies, theories, and, above all, of the sciences. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Every man that tried to destroy the Government, every man that shot at the holy flag in heaven, every man that starved our soldiers ... every man that wanted to burn the negro, every one that wanted to scatter yellow fever in the North, every man that opposed human liberty, that regarded the auction-block as an altar and the howling of the bloodhound as the music of the Union, every man who wept over the corpse of slavery, that thought lashes on the naked back were a legal tender for labour performed, every one willing to rob a mother of her child - every solitary one was a Democrat. — Robert Green Ingersoll

A man is not moral because he is obedient through fear or ignorance. Morality lives in the realm of perceived obligation ... — Robert Green Ingersoll

The greatest test of courage on earth is to bear defeat without losing heart. — Robert Green Ingersoll

In my judgment, the American people are too brave, too charitable, too generous, too magnanimous, to believe in the infamous dogma of an eternal hell. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Either god should have written a book to fit my brain, or he should have made my brain to fit his book. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Science has nothing in common with religion. Facts and miracles never did and never will agree. — Robert Green Ingersoll

If, with all the time at my disposal, with all the wealth of the resources of this vast universe, to do with as I will, I could not produce a better scheme of life than now prevails, I would be ashamed of my efforts and consider my work a humiliating failure. — Robert Green Ingersoll

It is hard to overstate the debt that we owe to men and women of genius. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I want no heaven for which I must give my reason; no happiness in exchange for my liberty, and no immortality that demands the surrender of my individuality. Better rot in the windowless tomb, to which there is no door but the red mouth of the pallid worm, than to wear the jeweled collar of a god. — Robert Green Ingersoll

It seems to me that if there is some infinite being who wants us to think alike he would have made us alike. — Robert Green Ingersoll

While I am opposed to all orthodox creeds, I have a creed myself; and my creed is this. Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so. This creed is somewhat short, but it is long enough for this life, strong enough for this world. If there is another world, when we get there we can make another creed. — Robert Green Ingersoll

If the property belongs to God he is able to pay the tax. — Robert Green Ingersoll

It is hard to conceive of the utter demoralization, of the political blindness and immorality, of the patriotic dishonesty, of the cruelty and degradation of a people who supplemented the incomparable Declaration of Independence with the Fugitive Slave Law. — Robert Green Ingersoll

The ministers are in duty bound to denounce all intellectual pride, and show that we are never quite so dear to God as when we admit that we are poor, corrupt and idiotic worms; that we never should have been born; that we ought to be damned without the least delay ... The old creed is still taught. They still insist that God is infinitely wise, powerful and good, and that all men are totally depraved. They insist that the best man god ever made, deserved to be damned the moment he was finished. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Lincoln was not a type. He stands alone - no ancestors, no fellows, no successors. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Instead of loving a God, we love each other. Instead of the religion of the sky-the religion of this world-the religion of the family-the love of husband for wife, of wife for husband-the love of all for children. So that now the real religion is: Let us live for each other; let us live for this world without regard for the past and without fear for the future. Let us use our faculties and our powers for the benefit of ourselves and others, knowing that if there be another world, the same philosophy that gives us joy here will make us happy there. — Robert Green Ingersoll

If there is any God, there is only one way to please him, and that is by a conscientious discharge of your obligations to your fellow men. — Robert Green Ingersoll

If nobody has too much, everybody will have enough. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Every sect is a certificate that God has not plainly revealed his will to man. To each reader the Bible conveys a different meaning. — Robert Green Ingersoll

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. — Robert Green Ingersoll

To be like other people is to be unlike ourselves. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Freedom believes in education - the salvation of slavery is ignorance. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Perish the infamous doctrine that man can have property in man. Let us resent with indignation every effort to put a chain upon our minds. — Robert Green Ingersoll

No man with a sense of humor ever founded a religion. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Let us account for all we see by the facts we know. If there are things for which we cannot account, let us wait for light. — Robert Green Ingersoll

It always has been and forever will be impossible for slavery or any kind or form of injustice to produce a great poet. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Character is made of duty and love and sympathy, and, above all, of living and working for others. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Argument cannot be answered with insults. Kindness is strength; anger blows out the lamp of the mind. — Robert Green Ingersoll

One laugh of a child will make the holiest day more sacred still. — Robert Green Ingersoll

I do not believe anything comes by chance. I regard the present as the necessary child of a necessary past. — Robert Green Ingersoll