Superstitions Quotes

• Science intensifies religious truth by cleansing it of ignorance and superstition.

  Charles Lindbergh

  Religious, Ignorance, Science

  "Antiseptic Christianity". "Time" Magazine, September 6, 1948.

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• We do not destroy religion by destroying superstition.

  Marcus Tullius Cicero

  Destroying

  "On Divination". Book by Marcus Tullius Cicero, 44 BC.

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• A belief which leaves no place for doubt is not a belief; it is a superstition.

  Jose Bergamin

  Motivational, Atheist, Humility

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• Superstition is great enemy of man but bigotry is worse.

  Swami Vivekananda

  Inspirational, Motivational, Men

  Swami Vivekananda (2016). “Vivekananda Reader”, p.143, Advaita Ashrama (A publication branch of Ramakrishna Math, Belur Math)

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• Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature.

  Helen Keller

  Death, Spiritual, Courage

  Helen Keller (1957). “The Open Door”, Garden City, N.Y. : Doubleday

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• Superstition is foolish, childish, primitive and irrational - but how much does it cost you to knock on wood?

  Judith Viorst

  Doe, Cost, Woods

  Judith Viorst (1987). “Love and Guilt and the Meaning of Life, Etc.”, Fireside

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• 

  Fear is the main source of superstition, and one of the main sources of cruelty. To conquer fear is the beginning of wisdom.

  Bertrand Russell

  Inspirational, Motivational, Fear

  Unpopular Essays (1950) "Outline of Intellectual Rubbish"

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• Faith must have adequate evidence, else it is mere superstition.

  Archibald Alexander Hodge

  Faith, Adequate, Evidence

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• A superstition is a premature explanation that overstays its time.

  George Iles

  Science, Statistics, Evidence

  George Iles (1918). “Canadian Stories”

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• When the human race has once acquired a superstition, nothing short of death is ever likely to remove it.

  Mark Twain

  Race, Conservatism, Questioning Beliefs

  Mark Twain (1960). “The autobiography of Mark Twain: including chapters now published for the first time”

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• I had only one superstition. I made sure to touch all the bases when I hit a home run.

  Babe Ruth

  Sports, Running, Home

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• The only foes that threaten America are the enemies at home, and these are ignorance, superstition and incompetence.

  Elbert Hubbard

  Home, Ignorance, America

  Harry Persons Taber, Elbert Hubbard (1904). “The Philistine”

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• History warns us that it is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and to end as superstitions.

  Thomas Huxley

  Truth, Humility, Fate

  "The Coming of Age of 'The Origin of Species' " (1880)

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• Laws should be made, not against quacks but against superstition.

  Rudolf Virchow

  Science, Law, Physicians

  "An Introduction to the History of Medicine". Book by Fielding Hudson Garrison, 1913.

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• Superstition! that horrid incubus which dwelt in darkness, shunning the light, with all its racks, and poison chalices, and foul sleeping draughts, is passing away without return. Religion cannot pass away. The burning of a little straw may hide the stars of the sky; but the stars are there and will reappear.

  Thomas Carlyle

  Stars, Sleep, Light

  Thomas Carlyle (1876). “The Carlyle Anthology”, p.253

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• There are people who think that honesty is always the best policy. This is a superstition. There are times when the appearance of it is worth six of it.

  Mark Twain

  Honesty, Inspiration, Thinking

  Mark Twain (2014). “Following The Equator”, p.59, Jazzybee Verlag

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• The most dangerous man to any government is the man who is able to think things out... without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost inevitably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane, intolerable.

  H. L. Mencken

  Men, Thinking, Social Taboos

  H.L. Mencken (2012). “Mencken Chrestomathy”, p.145, Vintage

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• The religious superstition is encouraged by means of the institution of churches, processions, monuments, festivities....The so-called clergy stupefy the masses....They befog the people and keep them in an eternal condition of stupefaction.

  Leo Tolstoy

  Religious, Mean, People

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• We would be a lot safer if the Government would take its money out of science and put it into astrology and the reading of palms. I used to think that science would save us, and science certainly tried. But we can't stand any more tremendous explosions, either for or against democracy.

  Kurt Vonnegut

  Reading, Astrology, Government

  Kurt Vonnegut's address to the graduating class at Bennington College, 1970.

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• May [our Declaration of Independence] be to the world, what I believe it will be (to some parts sooner, to others later, but finally to all), the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves, and to assume the blessings and security of self-government... All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Believe, Eye, Ignorance

  Thomas Jefferson (1943). “Thomas Jefferson: selections from his writings edited, with an introduction”

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• Death approaches, which is always impending like the stone over Tantalus: then comes superstition with which he who is imbued can never have peace of mind.

  Marcus Tullius Cicero

  Mind, Stones, Approach

  "Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations" by Jehiel Keeler Hoyt, De Finibus Bonorum et Malorum, I. 8, p. 770-71, 1922.

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• The office of reformer of the superstitions of a nation is ever dangerous.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Faith Religion, Office, Separation Of Church And State

  Thomas Jefferson (1854). “The Writings of Thomas Jefferson: Correspondence, contin. Reports and opinions while Secretary of State”, p.167

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• Count Hermann Keyserling once said truly that the greatest American superstition was the belief in facts.

  John Gunther

  Ironic, Facts, Belief

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• Mankind are an incorrigible race. Give them but bugbears and idols -- it is all that they ask; the distinctions of right and wrong, of truth and falsehood, of good and evil, are worse than indifferent to them.

  William Hazlitt

  Race, Idols, Evil

  William Hazlitt (1871). “The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt”, p.553

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• We boast our emancipation from many superstitions; but if we have broken any idols, it is through a transfer of idolatry.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Idols, History, Broken

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1851). “Essays, lectures and orations”, p.210

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