Jonathan Swift Quotes

As a reward for their efforts, however, those early Christians were beaten, stoned to death, thrown to the lions, tortured and crucified. Every conceivable method was used to stop them from talking.

No act which is directed against the Inquisition can deserve the name of a rebellion.

I die the King’s good servant, but God’s first.

To those who submit to rightful law and authority, all gentleness and forbearance; but to the petulant secessionist … death is a mercy, and the quicker he or she is disposed of the better.

God save Ireland, said the heroes God save Ireland said they all. Whether on the scaffold high, Or the battle field we die O’ what matter when for Ireland dear we fall.

Christianity has been responsible for plenty of horror and death in the world, all supposedly in God's name.

More people have been killed in the name of God than for any other reason.

I have always been on the side of the heretics, against those who burned them, because the heretics so often turned out to be right....Dead, but right.

I was an infant when my mother went To see an atheist burned. She took me there. The dark-robed priests were met around the pile; The multitude was gazing silently; And as the culprit passed with dauntless mien, Tempered disdain in his unaltering eye, Mixed with a quiet smile, shone calmly forth; The thirsty fire crept round his manly limbs; His resolute eyes were scorched to blindness soon; His death-pang rent my heart! the insensate mob Uttered a cry of triumph, and I wept. Weep not, child! cried my mother, for that man Has said, 'There is no God.'

Fear is a strange soil. It grows obedience like corn, which grow in straight lines to make weeding easier. But sometimes it grows the potatoes of defiance, which flourish underground.

On pain of death, no person be so bold.

Wherever it pleases God to put man in this world, the Christian must be ready for martyrdom and death. It is only in this way that man learns faith.

Defiance, not obedience, is the American's answer to overbearing authority.

Carrying the cross does mean following in Jesus' footsteps. And in His footsteps are rejection, brokenheartedness, persecution and death. There are not two Christs - an easy going one for easy going Christians, and a suffering one for exceptional believers. There is only one Christ. Are we willing to follow His lead?

Revolution calls my name. I will soon dwell in nothingness, and my name will be in the Pantheon of history.

Any kind of dictatorship, I'm uneasy. I just don't like dictators. I don't like crowds. I don't like hordes, and I don't like other people telling me what to do. This is probably a reaction against people telling me what to do when I was a kid. I won't join any group, espouse a cause against some other people.

People do what they are told not to do. It happens time and time again. Here on the frozen tundra, it is known as the Tongue on the Frozen Pump Handle principle.

I just wish I could have all this and stand up to her a little. Rose would." "Rose would have gotten herself arrested for treason the first time Tatiana asked her to do something.

Human history began with an act of disobedience and it is not unlikely that it will be terminated by an act of obedience.

Fools follow rules when the set commands ya...

Have the daring to stop doing the things you really don't want to do. Can you see them? Look closely. Can you observe the many things you do because you reluctantly feel you should or must? Watch closely. Examine every action and reaction. Do you act naturally or do you act because you feel compelled? If you feel compelled, stop. Compulsion is slavery. Example: Refuse to go along with the crowd.

The characteristic human trait is not awareness but conformity, and the characteristic result is religious warfare.

Yes, faith; it is my cousin's duty to make curtsy and say 'Father, as it please you.' But yet for all that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else make another curtsy and say 'Father, as it please me.

I was called before the head matron, a tall woman with a stolid face. She began taking my pedigree. What religion? was the first question. None, I am an atheist. Atheism is prohibited here. You will have to go to church. I replied that I would do nothing of the kind. I did not believe in anything the Church stood for and, not being a hypocrite, I would not attend.

Men live in glad obedience to the masters they believe in, or they live in a frictional opposition to the master they wish to undermine.