All Men Have Opinions, But Few Think.

But, Say You, Surely There Is Nothing Easier Than For Me To Imagine Trees, For Instance, In A Park [. . .] And Nobody By To Perceive Them. [...] The Objects Of Sense Exist Only When They Are Perceived; The Trees Therefore Are In The Garden [. . .] No Longer Than While There Is Somebody By To Perceive Them.

Many Things, For Aught I Know, May Exist, Whereof Neither I Nor Any Other Man Hath Or Can Have Any Idea Or Notion Whatsoever.

To Me It Seems That Liberty And Virtue Were Made For Each Other. If Any Man Wish To Enslave His Country, Nothing Is A Fitter Preparative Than Vice; And Nothing Leads To Vice So Surely As Irreligion.

That Thing Of Hell And Eternal Punishment Is The Most Absurd, As Well As The Most Disagreeable Thought That Ever Entered Into The Head Of Mortal Man.

Atheism ... That Bugbear Of Women And Fools ... Is The Very Top And Perfection Of Free-thinking. It Is The Grand Arcanum To Which A True Genius Naturally Riseth, By A Certain Climax Or Gradation Of Thought, And Without Which He Can Never Possess His Soul In Absolute Liberty And Repose.