Commerce is the great civilizer. We exchange ideas when we exchange fabrics. Robert Green Ingersoll More Quotes by Robert Green Ingersoll More Quotes From Robert Green Ingersoll It is labor that has made the world a fit habitation for the human race. Robert Green Ingersoll race work world We all know that men in moderate circumstances can have just as comfortable houses as the richest, just as comfortable clothing, just as good food. They can see just as fine paintings, just as marvelous statues, and they can hear just as good music. They can attend the same theaters and the same operas. They can enjoy the same sunshine, and above all, can love and be loved just as well as kings and millionaires. Robert Green Ingersoll sunshine money kings It cannot be said too often that actions are good or bad in the light of consequences, and that a clear perception of consequences would control actions. That which increases the sum of human happiness is moral; and that which diminishes the sum of human happiness is immoral. . . . Blind, unreasoning obedience is the enemy of morality. Robert Green Ingersoll perception light enemy Do the best that can be done and then . . . be resigned. Robert Green Ingersoll resigned done life The ideas of right and wrong change with the experience of the race, and this change is wrought by the gradual ascertaining of consequences - of results. Robert Green Ingersoll morality race ideas Music was born of love. Had there never been any human affection, there never could have been uttered a strain of music. Robert Green Ingersoll affection born art Logic is not satisfied with assertion. It cares nothing for the opinions of the great; nothing for the prejudices of the many, and least of all for the superstitions of the dead. Robert Green Ingersoll superstitions prejudice care Language is not subtle enough, tender enough, to express all that we feel; and when language fails, the highest and deepest longings are translated into music. Music is the sunshine - the climate - of the soul, and it floods the heart with a perfect June. Robert Green Ingersoll sunshine june art There is in all artists a little of the vagabond. Robert Green Ingersoll vagabonds artist art Sometime, it will be found that people can be changed only by changing their surroundings. It is alleged that, at least ninety-five percent of the criminals transported from England to Australia and other penal colonies, became good and useful citizens in a new world. Robert Green Ingersoll australia people world Tell me there is a God in the serene heavens that will damn his children for the expression of an honest belief! More men have died in their sins, judged by your orthodox creeds, than there are leaves in all the forests in the wide world ten thousand times over. Tell me these men are in Hell; that these men are in torment; that these children are in eternal pain, and that they are to be punished forever and forever! I denounce this doctrine as the most infamous of lies. Robert Green Ingersoll pain atheist children All should be taught that the highest ambition is to be happy, and to add to the well-being of others; that place and power are not necessary to success; that the desire to acquire great wealth is a kind of insanity. They should be taught that it is a waste of energy, a waste of thought, a waste of life, to acquire what you do not need and what you do not really use for the benefit of yourself or others. Robert Green Ingersoll money ambition insanity To the wise man, to the wise nation, the mistakes of the past are the torches of the present. Robert Green Ingersoll wise mistake life Shakespeare was an intellectual ocean, whose waves touched all the shores of thought; within which were all the tides and waves of destiny and will; over which swept all the storms of fate, ambition and revenge; upon which fell the gloom and darkness of despair and death and all the sunlight of content and love, and within which was the inverted sky lit with the eternal stars -- an intellectual ocean -- toward which all rivers ran, and from which now the isles and continents of thought receive their dew and rain. Robert Green Ingersoll stars revenge rain Just to the extent that the Bible was appealed to in matters of science, science was retarded; and just to the extent that science has been appealed to in matters of religion, religion has advanced - so that now the object of intelligent religionists is to adopt a creed that will bear the test and criticism of science. Robert Green Ingersoll intelligent criticism religion Custom meets us at the cradle and leaves us only at the tomb. Robert Green Ingersoll cradle peer-pressure tombs They knew that it was necessary to believe these things and to love God. They knew that there could be no salvation except by faith, and through the atoning blood of Jesus Christ. Robert Green Ingersoll god believe jesus Temptations are as thick as the leaves of the forest, and no one can be out of the reach of temptation unless he is dead. The great thing is to make people intelligent enough and strong enough, not to keep away from temptation, but to resist it. Robert Green Ingersoll intelligent strong people Where is the soul? . . . I refuse to believe anything of that kind without proof. The idea that, as soon as a man's breath leaves his body, the soul flops out like a chicken's head and flies off into space to find a lodgment where there [are] harps and haloes. Too much for me. Robert Green Ingersoll men believe ideas If the money is raised by taxation, then the burden will fall where it ought to fall, . . . and the rich and stingy will no longer be able to evade the duties of citizenship and of humanity. Robert Green Ingersoll political humanity fall
