Kill a man, and you are an assassin. Kill millions of men, and you are a conqueror. Kill everyone, and you are a god.

We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another.

The most dangerous madmen are those created by religion, and people whose aim is to disrupt society always know how to make good use of them.

One religion is as true as another.

The state dictates and coerces; religion teaches and persuades. The state enacts laws; religion gives commandments. The state is armed with physical force and makes use of it if need be; the force of religion is love and benevolence.

If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.

Religion is by no means a proper subject of conversation in mixed company.

The Church says that the earth is flat, but I know that it is round, for I have seen the shadow on the moon, and I have more faith in the shadow than in the Church.

God is a concept by which we measure our pain.

God is a complex of ideas formed by the tribe, the nation, and humanity, which awake and organize social feelings and aim to link the individual to society and to bridle the zoological individualism.

I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute, where no Catholic prelate would tell the president (should he be a Catholic) how to act and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote.

To doubt everything or to believe everything are two equally convenient solutions; both dispense with the need for thought.

I can’t see (or feel) the conflict between love and religion. To me they’re the same thing.