A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
Thomas PaineRead
Belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man.
Interpretation
Our beliefs significantly shape our character and behavior towards others.
Thomas Paine's quote suggests that the perception of a harsh and unforgiving deity will lead individuals to adopt similar cruelty in their own actions and judgments. It implies that oneβs understanding of divinity can deeply influence their moral compass and interactions with others, thus emphasizing the impact of belief systems on human behavior.
In practice
In a debate on the influence of religion on morality, this quote could illustrate how belief systems shape ethical behavior.
A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
That God cannot lie, is no advantage to your argument, because it is no proof that priests can not, or that the Bible does not.
I consider the war of America against Britain as the country's war, the public's war, or the war of the people in their own behalf, for the security of their natural rights, and the protection of their own property.
Had the news of salvation by Jesus Christ been inscribed on the face of the sun and the moon, in characters that all nations would have understood, the whole earth had known it in twenty-four hours, and all nations would have believed it; whereas, though it is now almost two thousand years since, as they tell us, Christ came upon earth, not a twentieth part of the people of the earth know anything of it, and among those who do, the wiser part do not believe it.
The end of all political associations is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man; and these rights are liberty, property, security, and resistance of oppression.
To reason with goverments, as they have existed for ages, is to argue with brutes. It is only from the nations themselves that reforms can be expected
All Christian language about the future is a set of signposts pointing into a mist.
Sincerity may be humble but she cannot be servile.
I am sorry to say that there is too much point to the wisecrack that life is extinct on other planets because their scientists were more advanced than ours.
Yes, making mock o' uniforms that guard you while you sleep... For it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that an' Chuck him out, the brute! But it's Saviour of his country, when the guns begins to shoot!
But as a Scot with a lifelong love of Scotland and the arts, I believe the opportunity of independence is too good to miss. Simply put there is no more creative an act than creating a new nation.
All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand! Oh, oh, oh!
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