Leslie Stephen

“Chance is a name for our ignorance.”

“The truth cannot be asserted without denouncing the falsehood.”

“If atheism is to be used to express the state of mind in which God is identified with the unknowable, and theology is pronounced to be a collection of meaningless words about unintelligible chimeras, then I have no doubt, and I think few people doubt.”

“If you wish at once to do nothing and be respectable nowadays, the best pretext is to be at work on some profound study.”

“Walking is the natural recreation for a man who desires not absolutely to suppress his intellect but to turn it out to play for a season. All great men of letters have therefore been enthusiastic walkers.”

“God is angry with man. Unless we believe and repent we shall all be damned. It is impossible, indeed, for its advocates even to say this without instantly contradicting themselves. Their doctrine frightens them. They explain in various ways that a great many people will be saved without believing, and that eternal damnation is not eternal nor damnation.”

“Every man who says frankly and fully what he thinks is doing a public service.”