Ralph Waldo Emerson Quotes

I am fascinated with religion or things that people believe in and question that. I think it's interesting.

Finding bad reasons for what one believes for other bad reasons - that's philosophy.

During the last century, and part of the one before, it was widely held that there was an unreconcilable conflict between knowledge and belief.

I was convinced that our beliefs are based much more on custom and example than on any certain knowledge.

As far as I'm concerned, humans have not yet come up with a belief that's worth believing.

One believes things because one has been conditioned to believe them. Finding bad reasons for what one believes for other bad reasons-that's philosophy. People believe in God because they've been conditioned to believe in God.

My work...is to shatter the faith of men here, there, and everywhere, faith in affirmation, faith in negation, and faith in abstention from faith, and this for the sake of faith in faith itself.

And if there is no god? You act as if there is, and it's the same thing.

I am an atheist, and if an atheist and a pope think the same things, there must be something true. There must be some human truth that is beyond religion.

Religion and science have always been matters of faith in something. It is the same something.

More persons, on the whole, are humbugged by believing in nothing, than by believing too much.

As a philosopher, if I were speaking to a purely philosophic audience I should say that I ought to describe myself as an Agnostic, because I do not think that there is a conclusive argument by which one can prove that there is not a God. On the other hand, if I am to convey the right impression to the ordinary man in the street I think that I ought to say that I am an Atheist, because, when I say that I cannot prove that there is not a God, I ought to add equally that I cannot prove that there are not the Homeric gods.

Auguries of innocence "The emmet's inch and eagle's mile Make lame philosophy to smile. He who doubts from what he sees Will ne'er believe, do what you please.

Newton, Pascal, Bossuet, Racine, F?nelon -- that is to say, some of the most enlightened men on earth, in the most philosophical of all ages -- have been believers in Jesus Christ; and the great Cond?, when dying, repeated these noble words, "Yes, I shall see God as He is, face to face!".

Reason is one thing and faith is another and reason can as little be made a substitute for faith, as faith can be made a substitute for reason.

The problem I want to talk to you about tonight is the problem of belief. What does it mean to believe? We use this word all the time, and I think behind it lurk some really extraordinary taboos and confusions. What I want to argue tonight is that how we talk about belief- how we fail to criticize or criticize the beliefs of others, has more importance to us personally, more consequence to us personally and to civilization than perhaps anything else that is in our power to influence.

Experience has repeatedly confirmed that well-known maxim of Bacon's that 'a little philosophy inclineth a man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion.' At the same time, when Bacon penned that sage epigram... he forgot to add that the God to whom depth in philosophy brings back men's minds is far from being the same from whom a little philosophy estranges them.

I can believe things that are true and things that aren't true and I can believe things where nobody knows if they're true or not.

Even David Hume, one of history most famous skeptics, said it's just barely possible that God exists.

I am not an atheist. I do not know if I can define myself as a pantheist. The problem involved is too vast for our limited minds.

A little philosophy makes a man an Atheist: a great deal converts him to religion

Action will furnish belief,-but will that belief be the true one? This is the point, you know.

I don't differentiate much, except in degree, between people who believe in religion from those who believe in astrology, magic or the supernatural.

Tell me," said the atheist , "Is there a God really?" Said the master, "If you want me to be perfectly honest with you, I will not answer." Later the disciples demanded to know why he had not answered. "Because the question is unanswerable," said the Master. "So you are an atheist?" "Certainly not. The atheist makes the mistake of denying that of which nothing may be said... and the theist makes the mistake of affirming it.

It is too late in the day for men of sincerity to pretend they believe in the Platonic mysticisms that three are one, and one is three; and yet that the one is not three, and the three are not one.