Superstitions Quotes - Page 18

• I wouldn't say that religion has promoted the social progress of mankind. I say that it has been a detriment to the progress of civilization, and I would also say this: that the emancipation of the mind from religious superstition is as essential to the progress of civilization as is emancipation from physical slavery.

  Culbert Olson

  Religious, Civilization, Mind

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• I think the most important factor moving us toward a secular society has been the educational factor. Our schools may not teach Johnny to read properly, but the fact that Johnny is in school until he is sixteen tends toward the elimination of religious superstition.

  Paul Blanshard

  Christian, Religious, Educational

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• When not protected by law, by popular favor or superstition, or by other special circumstances, [birds] yield very readily to the influences of civilization, and, though the first operations of the settler are favorable to the increase of many species, the great extension of rural and of mechanical industry is, in a variety of ways, destructive even to tribes not directly warred upon by man.

  George Perkins Marsh

  Science, Men, Yield

  George Perkins Marsh (2001). “So Great a Vision: The Conservation Writings of George Perkins Marsh”, University Press of New England

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• Speculation is perfectly all right, but if you stay there you've only founded a superstition. If you test it, you've started a science.

  Hal Clement

  Tests, Speculation, Ifs

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• Real life is about accepting ups and downs, the good and the bad, the possibility of failure as well as the ambition to succeed. Atheism speaks to the truth about our human nature because it recognizes all this and does not seek to shield us from the truth by myth and superstition

  Julian Baggini

  Real, Ambition, Atheism

  Julian Baggini (2003). “Atheism: A Very Short Introduction”, p.111, Oxford University Press

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• Fanaticism is the child of false zeal and of superstition, the father of intolerance and of persecution.

  John William Fletcher

  Children, Father, Philosophical

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• MAGIC, n. An art of converting superstition into coin. There are other arts serving the same high purpose, but the discreet lexicographer does not name them.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Art, Names, Magic

  Ambrose Bierce (2001). “The Unabridged Devil's Dictionary”, p.159, University of Georgia Press

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• We are now returning to the 18th century empirical approach with the new interest in the evolutionary basis of ethics, with 'experimental' moral philosophy and moral psychology. As a result, we understand better why moral formulas are experienced as ineluctable commands, even if there is no commander and even if the notion of an inescapable obligation is just superstition. So moral philosophy has made huge progress.

  Catherine Wilson

  Philosophy, Psychology, Progress

  Source: www.3ammagazine.com

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• The idea of "karma" reeks of primitive religious superstition, so I don't place a lot of stock in it.

  Jim Goad

  Karma, Religious, Ideas

  Source: love-and-pop.com

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• In every age its (liberty's) progress has been beset by its natural enemies, by ignorance and superstition, by lust of conquest and by love of ease, by the strong man's craving for power, and the poor man's craving for food

  Lord Acton

  Wisdom, Strong, Ignorance

  John Emerich Edward Dalberg, Lord Acton (2016). “The History of Freedom (and other Essays)”, p.28, Jazzybee Verlag

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• The Jews would not willingly tread upon the smallest piece of paper in their way, but took it up; for possibly, they say, the name of God may be on it. Though there was a little superstition in this, yet truly there is nothing but good religion in it, if we apply it to men. Trample not on any; there may be some work of grace there, that thou knowest not of. The name of God may be written upon that soul thou treadest on; it may be a soul that Christ thought so much of, as to give His precious blood for it; therefore despise it not.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Work, Men, Blood

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge, H. J. Jackson, Kathleen Coburn, Bart Keith Winer (1992). “Collected Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge: Marginalia (5 v.)”, Bollingen

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• One of the things I did during my 17 years as a psychiatric social worker was go around and find people with mental crutches, and every time I found one, I kicked those goddamn crutches until they flew. You know what happened? Every single one of those people has been able to walk without the crutches better, in fact. Were they giving up anything intrinsically valuable? Just their irrational reliance upon superstitions and supernatural nonsense. Perhaps this sort of claptrap was good for the Stone Age, when people actually believed that if they prayed for rain they would get it.

  Madalyn Murray O'Hair

  Giving Up, Rain, Years

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• A dull, dark, depressing day in Winter: the whole world looks like a Methodist church at Wednesday night prayer meeting.

  H. L. Mencken

  Depressing, Prayer, Dark

  H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.13, Knopf

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• Conscience without judgment is superstition.

  Benjamin Whichcote

  Judgment, Conscience

  Benjamin Whichcote, Anthony Tuckney (1753). “Moral and religious aphorisms [collected by J. Jeffery from the papers of B. Whichcote]. Now re-publ., with additions, by S. Salter. To which are added, Eight letters: which passed between dr. Whichcote, and dr. Tuckney”, p.46

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• It's raw, unbridled superstition for these people to claim that words can harm you.

  Frank Zappa

  People, Claims, Harm

  Source: afka.net

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• In its Roman-era setting, for example, Christianity was so different that critics of the time referred to it as a "superstition" (meaning a bogus or dangerous religion).

  Larry Hurtado

  Example, Different, Eras

  Source: www.patheos.com

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• A superstition which pretends to be scientific creates a much greater confusion of thought than one which contents itself with simple popular practices.

  Johan Huizinga

  Simple, Practice, Confusion

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• Actually, I never tell for whom my songs are written. It's a kind of superstition! I started writing songs for not having the courage to say certain things in people's faces and started to put these feelings on paper... Over the years, became a mania and then I never talk about for whom they are made.

  Enrique Iglesias

  Song, Writing, Years

  Source: www.enriqueiglesias.com.br

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• Once we make our decision, all things will come to us. Auspicious signs are not a superstition, but a confirmation. They are a response.

  Ming-Dao Deng

  Decision, Confirmation, Response

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• Progress is the victory of a new thought over old superstitions.

  Elizabeth Cady Stanton

  Victory, Progress, New Thought

  Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan Brownell Anthony, Ellen Carol DuBois (1992). “The Elizabeth Cady Stanton-Susan B. Anthony reader: correspondence, writings, speeches”, Northeastern Univ Pr

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• There is no essential difference between sticking pins into a wax image of an enemy and burning candles in front of a wax image of the Virgin. You may think that both these practices are gross superstition, but you can hardly think that one is real and potent and deny reality and potency to the other.

  Dion Fortune

  Real, Thinking, Practice

  Dion Fortune (2016). “Psychic self-defense: The Classic Instruction Manual for Protecting Yourself Against Paranormal Attack”, p.13, Dion Fortune

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• History will also afford frequent opportunities of showing the necessity of a public religion, from its usefulness to the public; the advantage of a religious character among private persons; the mischiefs of superstition, and the excellency of the Christian religion above all others, ancient or modern.

  Benjamin Franklin

  Christian, Education, Religious

  Benjamin Franklin (1844). “The Works of Benjamin Franklin: Containing Several Political and Historical Tracts Not Included in Any Former Edition, and Many Letters, Official and Private, Not Hitherto Published; with Notes and a Life of the Author”, p.573

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• To get any reason out of the mass of incongruity we call human life, we have to transcend our reason, but we must do it scientifically, slowly, by regular practice, and we must cast off all superstition.

  Swami Vivekananda

  Practice, Reason, Mass

  Swami Vivekananda (2016). “Raja Yoga: Conquering the Internal Nature”, p.52, Advaita Ashrama

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• A degree of culture, and assuredly a very high one, is attained when man rises above superstitions and religious notions and fears, and, for instance, no longer believes in guardian angels or in original sin, and has also ceased to talk of the salvation of his soul.

  Friedrich Nietzsche

  Religious, Atheist, Believe

  Friedrich Nietzsche (2012). “Human, All-Too-Human: Parts One and Two”, p.27, Courier Corporation

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• Freemasonry teaches not merely temperance, fortitude, prudence, justice, brotherly love, relief, and truth, but liberty, equality, and fraternity, and it denounces ignorance, superstition, bigotry, lust tyranny and despotism.

  Theodore Roosevelt

  Ignorance, Justice, Lust

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