One believes things because one has been conditioned to believe them.
Once she knows how to read there’s only one thing you can teach her to believe in – and that is herself.
NEVER CONFUSE FAITH, OR BELIEF—OF ANY KIND—WITH SOMETHING EVEN REMOTELY INTELLECTUAL.
Men tend to have the beliefs that suit their passions. Cruel men believe in a cruel god and use their belief to excuse cruelty. Only kindly men believe in a kindly god, and they would be kindly in any case.
Many a prophecy, by the mere force of its being believed, is transmuted to fact.
Man is certainly crazy. He could not make a mite, and he makes gods by the dozen.[L’homme est bien insensé: il ne sçauroit forger vn ciron, et forge des Dieux à douzaines.]
Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones.
Life is both subtler and more complex than some of us like to believe. So if you haven’t done so already, review your beliefs and decide which ones you might change now and what you would change those beliefs to.
Let anyone speak long enough, he will get believers.
Just as no one can be forced to believe, so no one can be forced to disbelieve.[So wie niemand zum Glauben gezwungen werden kann, so auch niemand zum Unglauben.]
It matters little what you believe, so long as you don’t altogether believe it.
It is only when you meet someone of a different culture from yourself that you begin to realize what your own beliefs really are.
