A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right.
Thomas PaineRead
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.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects on the difficulty of spreading the message of salvation despite its importance.
Thomas Paine emphasizes the irony that had the message of salvation through Jesus Christ been made universally visible and understandable, it would have been accepted by everyone in a short time. However, despite the passage of nearly two thousand years since Christ's arrival, only a fraction of the world's population is aware of this message, and skepticism remains even among those who are informed.
Themes
SalvationTruthBeliefSkepticismKnowledgeUniversal
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a discussion about the importance of spreading positive messages in society.
More from Thomas Paine
All quotes →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.
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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.
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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.
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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
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Belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man.
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These reflections made me very sensible of the goodness of Providence to me, and very thankful for my present condition, with all its hardships and misfortunes ; and this part also I cannot but recommend to the reflection of those who are apt, in their misery, to say, Is any affliction like mine? Let them consider how much worse the cases of some people are, and their case might have been, if Providence had thought fit.
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