Very few men can be genuinely happy in a life involving continual self-assertion against the skepticism of the mass of mankind, unless they can shut ….

We need a science to save us from science..

The question of "unreality"is a very important one. Misled by grammar, the great majority of those logicians who have dealt with this question have d….

The widespread interest in gossip is inspired, not by a love of knowledge but by malice: no one gossips about other people's secret virtues, but only….

I should like to believe my people's religion, which was just what I could wish, but alas, it is impossible. I have really no religion, for my God, b….

In astronomy, the law of gravitation is plainly better worth knowing than the position of a particular planet on a particular night, or even on every….

[Regarding] the convention that clergymen are more virtuous than other men. Any average selection of mankind, set apart and told that it excels the r….

That which exists through itself is called The Eternal. The Eternal has neither name nor shape. It is the one essence, the one primal spirit. Essence….

The raw fruits of the earth were made for human sustenance. Even the white tails of rabbits, according to some theologians, have a purpose, namely to….

Historically, it is quite doubtful whether Christ ever existed at all, and if He did we do not know anything about Him..

That the world is in a bad shape is undeniable, but there is not the faintest reason in history to suppose that Christianity offers a way out..

Artists are on the average less happy than men of science..

Obviousness is always the enemy of correctness..

Thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habit..

A word is used "correctly" when the average hearer will be affected by it in the way intended. This is a psychological, not a literary, definition of….

The three main extra-rational activities in modern life are religion, war, and love. all these are extra-rational, but love is not anti-rational, tha….

There are two ways of avoiding fear: one is by persuading ourselves that we are immune from disaster, and the other is by the practice of sheer coura….

Americans need rest, but do not know it..

Mankind is divided into two classes: those who, being artificial, praise nature, and those who, being natural, praise art..

Perhaps the nuclear physicists have come so near to the ultimate secrets that He thinks it time to bring their activities to a stop. And what simpler….

Love is a slippery eel that bites like hell.