Every religion is good that teaches man to be good and I know of none that instructs him to be bad. – Thomas Paine
Our citizenship in the United States is our national character. Our citizenship in any particular state is only our local distinction. By the latter we are known at home, by the former to the world. Our great title is AMERICANS — our inferior one varies with the place. – Thomas Paine
A thing moderately good is not so good as it ought to be. Moderation in temper is always a virtue but moderation in principle is always a vice. – Thomas Paine
It is not a God, just and good, but a devil, under the name of God, that the Bible describes. – Thomas Paine
Ah, if he could have plunged up into the clouds, so as to sweep thereon through the undulating heavens over the boundless earth!—ah, if he could have floated with the flower-fragrance over the flowers,—could have streamed with the wind over the summits, through the woods! – Jean Paul Friedrich Richter, Hesperus, or Forty-Five Dog-Post-Days: A Biography,