Quotes by Robert G. Ingersoll

About Robert G. Ingersoll:

Robert Green was a lawyer, a Civil War veteran, political leader, and orator of United States during the Golden Age of Free Thought, noted for his broad range of culture and his defense of agnosticism. He was nicknamed "The Great Agnostic".
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The theologians dead, knew no more than the theologians now living. More than this cannot be said. About this world little is known,—about another world, nothing. Our fathers were intellectual serfs, and their fathers were slaves. The makers of our...

Robert G. Ingersoll

With every drop of my blood I hate and execrate every form of tyranny, every form of slavery. I hate dictation. I love liberty.

Robert G. Ingersoll

The man who does not do his own thinking is a slave, and is a traitor to himself and to his fellowmen.

Robert G. Ingersoll

Liberty sustains the same relation to mind that space does to matter.

Robert G. Ingersoll

This is my doctrine: Give every other human being every right you claim for yourself. Keep your mind open to the influences of nature. Receive new thoughts with hospitality. Let us advance.

Robert G. Ingersoll

The mechanic, when a wheel refuses to turn, never thinks of dropping on his knees and asking the assistance of some divine power. He knows there is a reason. He knows that something is too large or too small; that there is something wrong with his ma...

Robert G. Ingersoll

When I think of how much this world has suffered; when I think of how long our fathers were slaves, of how they cringed and crawled at the foot of the throne, and in the dust of the altar, of how they abased themselves, of how abjectly they stood in ...

Robert G. Ingersoll

The theologians dead, knew no more than the theologians now living.

Robert G. Ingersoll

As a rule, theologians know nothing of this world, and far less of the next; but they have the power of stating the most absurd propositions with faces solemn as stupidity touched by fear. It is a part of their business to malign and vilify the , , ,...

Robert G. Ingersoll

The telescope destroyed the firmament, did away with the heaven of the New Testament, rendered the ascension of our Lord and the assumption of his Mother infinitely absurd, crumbled to chaos the gates and palaces of the New Jerusalem, and in their pl...

Robert G. Ingersoll

Arguments cannot be answered by personal abuse; there is no logic in slander, and falsehood, in the long run, defeats itself.

Robert G. Ingersoll

If God created the universe, there was a time when he commenced to create. Back of that commencement there must have been an eternity. In that eternity what was this God doing? He certainly did not think. There was nothing to think about. He did not ...

Robert G. Ingersoll

We know that there are many animals on this continent not found in the Old World. These must have been carried from here to the ark, and then brought back afterwards. Were the peccary, armadillo, ant-eater, sloth, agouti, vampire-bat, marmoset, howli...

Robert G. Ingersoll

When I speak of God, I mean that god who prevented man from putting forth his hand and taking also of the fruit of the tree of life that he might live forever; of that god who multiplied the agonies of woman, increased the weary toil of man, and in h...

Robert G. 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. To account for anything by supernatural agencies is, in fact to say that we do not know. Theology is not what we know about Go...

Robert G. Ingersoll

For many years I have regarded the Pentateuch simply as a record of a barbarous people, in which are found a great number of the ceremonies of savagery, many absurd and unjust laws, and thousands of ideas inconsistent with known and demonstrated fact...

Robert G. Ingersoll

To hate man and worship God seems to be the sum of all the creeds.

Robert G. Ingersoll

And why does this same God tell me how to raise my children when he had to drown his?

Robert G. Ingersoll

Let us forget that we are Baptists, Methodists, Catholics, Presbyterians, or Free-thinkers, and remember only that we are men and women. After all, man and woman are the highest possible titles. All other names belittle us, and show that we have, to ...

Robert G. Ingersoll

If the Pentateuch is not inspired in its astronomy, geology, geography, history or philosophy, if it is not inspired concerning slavery, polygamy, war, law, religious or political liberty, or the rights of men, women and children, what is it inspired...

Robert G. Ingersoll

I want to do what little I can to make my country truly free, to broaden the intellectual horizon of our people, to destroy the prejudices born of ignorance and fear, to do away with the blind worship of the ignoble past, with the idea that all the g...

Robert G. Ingersoll

Author Bio

  • NameRobert G. Ingersoll
  • DescriptionUnion United States Army officer
  • BornAugust 11, 1833
  • DiedJuly 21, 1899
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionLawyer; Politician; Writer; Essayist