Thomas Paine

"The creation which we behold is the real and ever existing word of God."

"Where knowledge is a duty, ignorance is a crime."

"All natural institutions of things conduce to moral order and order to peace."

"The continual accumulation of knowledge is the only thing that separates us from the beasts."

"It is the nature of the human mind to be drawn toward truth."

"Pride is not the heritage of man; humility and confidence are the strength of the soul."

"The instant we fashion an image of God in our minds, we fashion a tyrant."

"Every religion is good that teaches man to be good."

"The condition upon which God hath given liberty to man is eternal vigilance."

"Shame is the lineal product of falsehood and begins with it."

"Let us believe neither of them, but judge for ourselves."

"The world continues to offer glittering prizes to those who have stout hearts and sharp swords."

"God Almighty is himself the center and circumference of all knowledge."

"I never submitted the whole system of my shackles to the destruction of my mind."

"Hereditary succession in the executive made government hereditary property."

"When we are not ourselves, we are lost."

"The greatest deception is self-deception."

"Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men but a right that belongs to us by the laws of God and nature."

"Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions of an insatiable vengeance, attributed to the God of the Christian Bible, we feel outraged."

"Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil."

"The only security of all is in a balance of power."

"We are now to explode the doctrine of passive obedience and non-resistance."

"Every religion has something beautiful in it, and every religion has something ugly in it."

"Suspicion, the companion of weak minds, the offspring of fear, mixes itself with courage."

"Intoxication is the first state of slavery."

"I would not have joined the British army to fight against the Americans."

"The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is reason."

"The only thing that can be eternal is the work that one does."

"That which we obtain too easily, we esteem too lightly."

"When any calamity has been suffered the first thing to be remembered is how much has been escaped."