Robert G. Ingersoll Quotes

True belief is not about blind submission. It is about open-eyed acceptance, and acceptance requires persistent distance from the truth, and that distance is doubt. Doubt, in other words, can feed faith, rather than destroy it. And it forces us, even while believing, to recognize our fundamental duty with respect to God's truth: humility. We do not know. Which is why we believe.

All that belongs to human understanding, in this deep ignorance and obscurity, is to be sceptical, or at least cautious, and not to admit of any hypothesis whatever, much less of any which is supported by no appearance of probability.

I know too much to be a sceptic and too little to be a dogmatist.

I am an agnostic; I do not pretend to know what many ignorant men are sure of.

Dogmatism and skepticism are both, in a sense, absolute philosophies; one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or ignorance.

On the road halfway between faith and criticism stands the inn of reason. Reason is faith in what can be understood without faith, but it's still a faith, since to understand presupposes that there's something understandable.

Belief is in ignorance. If you know, you know. And it is good that if you don’t know, know that you don’t know — the belief can deceive you. The belief can create an atmosphere in your mind, where, without knowing, you start thinking that you know. Belief is not trust, and the more strongly you say that you believe totally, the more you are afraid of the doubt within you.

It would be the height of absurdity to label ignorance tempered by humility "faith"! (Institutio III.2.3)

there is only one thing we do know and that is that we do not know anything.

The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, and wiser people so full of doubts.

I do not consider it an insult, but rather a compliment to be called an agnostic. I do not pretend to know where many ignorant men are sure - that is all that agnosticism means.

Doubt is the middle position between knowledge and ignorance. It encompasses cynicism but also genuine questioning.

I do not pretend to know where many ignorant men are sure - that is all that agnosticism means.

Doubt is not below knowledge, but above it.

Who knows most, doubts most.

Faith is a poison that paralyzes the mind. In all the days of your life, seek knowledge!

Doubt is the offspring of knowledge: the savage never doubts at all.

In philosophy you're never 100% sure. You're always undermining what you think you know. That's always been my philosophy and my intellectual ethos.

Agnosticism, in fact, is not a creed, but a method, the essence of which lies in the rigorous application of a single principle. ... Positively the principle may be expressed: In matters of the intellect, follow your reason as far as it will take you, without regard to any other consideration. And negatively: In matters of the intellect, do not pretend that conclusions are certain which are not demonstrated or demonstrable.

When did ignorance become a point of view?

It is not proof that I sought. I, of all men, know that proof is but a fallacy invented by man to justify to himself and his fellows his own crass lust and folly.

It was the schoolboy who said, ""Faith is believing what you know ain't so.""

A mind that questions everything, unless strong enough to bear the weight of its ignorance, risks questioning itself and being engulfed in doubt.

No one is infallible, and no one can claim a monopoly on truth or virtue. It would be contradictory for skepticism to seek to translate itself into a new faith.

Not far from the invention of fire we must rank the invention of doubt.