John was a very political animal. The thing that politics did and that fame as an entertainer didn't do was provide you with an en...gine for propagating your theories and beliefs. The one thing John would have liked more than anything else was his own political machine. Even though he would profess that politics is bullshit, he just wouldn't call it "politics." He'd call it "peace."LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The New Year is the season in which custom seems more particularly to authorize civil and harmless lies, under the name of complim...ents. People reciprocally profess wishes which they seldom form and concern which they seldom feel.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Men are like plants; the goodness and flavor of the fruit proceeds from the peculiar soil and exposition in which they grow. We ar...e nothing but what we derive from the air we breathe, the climate we inhabit, the government we obey, the system of religion we profess, and the nature of our employment.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Cows are amongst the gentlest of breathing creatures; none show more passionate tenderness to their young when deprived of them; a...nd, in short, I am not ashamed to profess a deep love for these quiet creatures.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
There are few things in which we deceive ourselves more than in the esteem we profess to entertain for our firends. It is little b...etter than a piece of quackery. The truth is, we think of them as we please--that is, as they please or displease us.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
And I profess still, that whatsoever the church of England (the church, I say, not every doctor) shall forbid me to say in matter ...of faith, I shall abstain from saying it, excepting this point, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, died for my sins. As for other doctrines, I think it unlawful, if the church define them, for any member of the church to contradict them.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Government by average opinion is merely a circuitous method of going to the devil; those who profess to lead but in fact slavishly... follow this average opinion are simply the fastest runners and the loudest squeakers of the herd which is rushing blindly down to its destruction.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Missionaries, whether of philosophy or religion, rarely make rapid way, unless their preachings fall in with the prepossessions of... the multitude of shallow thinkers, or can be made to serve as a stalking-horse for the promotion of the practical aims of the still larger multitude, who do not profess to think much, but are quite certain they want a great deal.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I was brought up a rigid Presbyterian, to which I have always adhered. Our excellent Constitution guarantees to everyone freedom o...f religion, and charity tells us--and you know charity is the real basis of all true religion--and charity says "judge the tree by its fruit." All who profess Christianity believe in a Savior and that by and through him we must be saved. We ought therefore to consider all good Christians whose walks correspond with their professions, be they Presbyterian, Episcopalian, Baptist, Methodist, or Roman Catholic. Let it be always remembered ... that no established religion can exist under [our] glorious Constitution.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Poetry has this much, at least, in common with religion, that its standards were fixed long ago, by certain inspired writers, whos...e authority it is no longer lawful to call in question; and that many profess to be entirely devoted to it, who have no good works to produce in support of their pretensions. The catholic poetical church, too, has worked but few miracles since the first ages of its establishment; and has been more prolific, for a long time, of doctors than of saints: It has had its corruptions, and reformation also, and has given birth to an infinite variety of heresies and errors, the followers of which have hated and persecuted each other as cordially as other bigots.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »