Critics Of Religion

"Cur non ut plenus vitae conviva recedis aequo animoque capis securam, stulte, quietem?"

"Vitaque mancipio, nulli datur, omnibus usu."

"Nam petere imperium quod inanest nec datur umquam, atque in eo semper durum sufferre laborem, hoc est adverso nixantem trudere monte saxa quod tamen e summo iam vertice rursum volvitur et plani raptim petit aequora campi."

"Et si iam nostro sentit de corpore postquam distractast animi natura animaeque potestas, tamen est ad nos, qui comptu coniugioque corporis atque animae consistimus uniter apti. nec, si materiem nostram collegerit aetas post obitum rursumque redegerit ut sita nunc est, atque iterum nobis fuerint data lumina vitae, quicquam tamen ad nos id quoque factum, interrupta semel cum sit repetentia nostri. et nunc nil ad nos de nobis attinet, ante qui fuimus, [neque] iam de illis nos adficit angor. nam cum respicias inmensi temporis omne praeteritum spatium, tum motus materiai quam sint, facile hoc adcredere possis, saepe in eodem, ut nunc sunt, ordine posta haec eadem, quibus e nunc nos sumus, ante fuisse. nec memori tamen id quimus reprehendere mente; inter enim iectast vitai pausa vageque deerrarunt passim motus ab sensibus omnes."

"Nec prorsum vitam ducendo demimus hilum tempore de mortis nec delibare valemus."

"Praeterea gigni pariter cum corpore et una crescere sentimus pariterque senescere mentem. nam vel ut infirmo pueri teneroque vagantur corpore, sic animi sequitur sententia tenvis. inde ubi robustis adolevit viribus aetas, consilium quoque maius et auctior est animi vis. post ubi iam validis quassatum est viribus aevi corpus et obtusis ceciderunt viribus artus, claudicat ingenium, delirat lingua labat mens, omnia deficiunt atque uno tempore desunt. ergo dissolui quoque convenit omnem animai naturam, ceu fumus, in altas aëris auras; quando quidem gigni pariter pariterque videmus crescere et, ut docui, simul aevo fessa fatisci."

"If Lucretius had not been spoiled by the Epicurean system, we should have had a far superior poem to any now in existence. As mere poetry, it is the first of Latin poems."

"Nil igitur mors est ad nos neque pertinet hilum, quandoquidem natura animi mortalis habetur."

"Omnia qua propter debent per inane quietum aeque ponderibus non aequis concita ferri."

"Dum taxat, rerum magnarum parva potest res exemplare dare et vestigia notitiae."

"Infidi maris insidis virisque dolumque ut vitare velint, neve ullo tempore credant subdola cum ridet placidi pellacia ponti."

"Nam veluti pueri trepidant atque omnia caecis in tenebris metuunt, sic nos in luce timemus interdum, nilo quae sunt metuenda magis quam quae pueri in tenebris pavitant finguntque futura. hunc igitur terrorem animi tenebrasque necessest non radii solis neque lucida tela diei discutiant sed naturae species ratioque."

"Sic rerum summa novatur semper, et inter se mortales mutua vivunt. augescunt aliae gentes, aliae minuuntur, inque brevi spatio mutantur saecla animantum et quasi cursores vitae lampada tradunt."

"Caelesti sumus omnes semine oriundi."

"Sed nihil dulcius est, bene quam munita tenere edita doctrina sapientum templa serena, despicere unde queas alios passimque videre errare atque viam palantis quaerere vitae, certare ingenio, contendere nobilitate, noctes atque dies niti praestante labore ad summas emergere opes rerumque potiri."

"Suave mari magno turbantibus aequora ventis e terra magnum alterius spectare laborem; non quia vexari quemquamst jucunda voluptas, sed quibus ipse malis careas quia cernere suave est."

"O miseras hominum mentes, o pectora caeca! qualibus in tenebris vitae quantisque periclis degitur hoc aevi quod cumquest! nonne videre nihil aliud sibi naturam latrare, nisi ut qui corpore seiunctus dolor absit, mente fruatur iucundo sensu cura semota metuque?"

"Omnis cum in tenebris praesertim vita laboret."

"Ita res accendent lumina rebus."

"Cedit item retro, de terra quod fuit ante, in terras."

"Haud igitur redit ad nihilum res ulla."

"Nil posse creari de nihilo."

"Nequeunt oculis rerum primordia cerni."

"Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum."

"Saepius illa religio peperit scelerosa atque impia facta."

"Nullam rem e nihilo gigni divinitus umquam."

"Stilicidi casus lapidem cavat."

"Etsi difficiile esse videtur credere quicquam in rebus solido reperiri corpore posse. transit enim fulmen caeli per saepta domorum, clamor ut ad voces; flamen candescit in igni dissiliuntque ferre ferventi saxa vapore. tum labefactatus rigor auri solvitur aestu; tum glacies aeris flamma devicta liquescit; permanat calor argentum penetraleque frigus quando utrumque manu retinentes pocula rite sensimus infuso lympharum rore superne."

"Ergo vivida vis animi pervicit et extra processit longe flammantia moenia mundi atque omne immensum peragravit mente animoque."

"Quae bene cognita si teneas, natura videtur Libera continuo, dominis privata superbis, ipsa sua per se sponte omnia dis agere expers."

"Quare religio pedibus subiecta vicissim opteritur, nos exaequat victoria caelo."

"Sed neque tam facilis res ulla est, quin ea primum difficilis magis ad credendum constet, itemque nil adeo magnum neque tam mirabile quicquam, quod non paulatim minuant mirarier omnes."

"Desine qua propter novitate exterritus ipsa expuere ex animo rationem, sed magis acri iudicio perpende, et si tibi vera videntur, dede manus, aut, si falsum est, accingere contra."

"Quo magis in dubiis hominem spectare periclis convenit adversisque in rebus noscere qui sit; nam verae voces tum demum pectore ab imo eliciuntur et eripitur persona, manet res."

"Life isn’t divided into genres. It’s a horrifying, romantic, tragic, comical, science-fiction cowboy detective novel. You know, with a bit of pornography if you're lucky."

"Now, as I understand it, the bards were feared. They were respected, but more than that they were feared. If you were just some magician, if you'd pissed off some witch, then what's she gonna do, she's gonna put a curse on you, and what's gonna happen? Your hens are gonna lay funny, your milk's gonna go sour, maybe one of your kids is gonna get a hare-lip or something like that — no big deal. You piss off a bard, and forget about putting a curse on you, he might put a satire on you. And if he was a skilful bard, he puts a satire on you, it destroys you in the eyes of your community, it shows you up as ridiculous, lame, pathetic, worthless, in the eyes of your community, in the eyes of your family, in the eyes of your children, in the eyes of yourself, and if it's a particularly good bard, and he's written a particularly good satire then, three hundred years after you're dead, people are still gonna be laughing at what a twat you were."

"Most of the people who get sent to die in wars are young men who've got a lot of energy and would probably rather, in a better world, be putting that energy into copulation rather than going over there and blowing some other young man's guts out."

"Admittedly, I do have several bones... whole war fields full of bones, in fact... to pick with organised religion of whatever stripe. This should be seen as a critique of purely temporal agencies who have, to my mind, erected more obstacles between whatever notion of spirituality and Godhead one subscribes to than they have opened doors. To me, the difference between Godhead and the Church is the difference between Elvis and Colonel Parker... although that conjures images of God dying on the toilet, which is not what I meant at all."

"If there was no point to being offensive (as with a high number of comedians who frequent the average working men's club), then the perpetrator will either be squeezed out of business or be relegated to working in bottom-of-the-heap sleaze pits where nothing more than vulgarity is demanded. Alternately, if there was some integrity behind all the outrage, the perpetrators become persecuted legends with a fanatical cult following and generally exercise tremendous influence upon the artists that come after them. In comedy, Lenny Bruce is an example. In music, perhaps the Sex Pistols. In comic books, EC would fit the bill."

"The DC comics were always a lot more true blue. Very enjoyable, but they were big, brave uncles and aunties who probably insisted on a high standard of you know mental and physical hygiene. Whereas the Stan Lee stuff, the Marvel comics, he went from one-dimensional characters whose only characteristic was they dressed up in costumes and did good. Whereas Stan Lee had this huge breakthrough of two-dimensional characters. So, they dress up in costumes and do good, but they've got a bad heart. Or a bad leg. I actually did think for a long while that having a bad leg was an actual character trait."

"Truth is a well-known pathological liar. It invariably turns out to be Fiction wearing a fancy frock. Self-proclaimed Fiction, on the other hand, is entirely honest. You can tell this, because it comes right out and says, "I'm a Liar," right there on the dust jacket."

"I'm not a millionaire but I'm very comfortable doing what I do, and I'm more productive now than I was in my mid-20s. It's all down to functionality eventually. If you're functional it doesn't matter if you're mad."

"It struck me that it might be interesting for once to do an almost blue-collar warlock. Somebody who was streetwise, working class, and from a different background than the standard run of comic book mystics. Constantine started to grow out of that."

"Yes, there is a conspiracy, in fact there are a great number of conspiracies that are all tripping each other up. And all of those conspiracies are run by paranoid fantasists and ham-fisted clowns. If you are on a list targeted by the CIA, you really have nothing to worry about. If however, you have a name similar to somebody on a list targeted by the CIA, then you are dead."

"It doesn’t even matter if we ever fire these missiles or not. They are having their effect upon us because there is a generation growing up now who cannot see past the final exclamation mark of a mushroom cloud. They are a generation who can see no moral values that do not end in a crackling crater somewhere. I’m not saying that nuclear bombs are at the root of all of it, but I think it is very, very naïve to assume that you can expose the entire population of the world to the threat of being turned to cinders without them starting to act, perhaps, a little oddly. I believe in some sort of strange fashion that the presence of the atom bomb might almost be forcing a level of human development that wouldn’t have occurred without the presence of the atom bomb. Maybe this degree of terror will force changes in human attitudes that could not have occurred without the presence of these awful, destructive things. Perhaps we are faced with a race between the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse in one line and the 7th Cavalry in the other. We have not got an awful lot of mid ground between Utopia and Apocalypse, and if somehow our children ever see the day in which it is announced that we do not have these weapons any more, and that we can no longer destroy ourselves and that we’ve got to do something else to do with our time than they will have the right to throw up their arms, let down their streamers and let forth a resounding cheer."

"I've no objection to the term 'graphic novel,' as long as what it is talking about is actually some sort of graphic work that could conceivably be described as a novel. My main objection to the term is that usually it means a collection of six issues of Spider-Man, or something that does not have the structure or any of the qualities of a novel, but is perhaps roughly the same size."

"The main thing that I learned about conspiracy theory is that conspiracy theorists actually believe in a conspiracy because that is more comforting. The truth of the world is that it is chaotic. The truth is, that it is not the Jewish banking conspiracy or the grey aliens or the 12-foot reptiloids from another dimension that are in control. The truth is more frightening, nobody is in control. The world is rudderless."

"I despise the comic industry, but I will always love the comic medium."

"Originally I was content to just simply accept the money, that was offered when people had adapted my comic books into films. Eventually I decided to refuse to accept any of the money for the films, and to ask if my name could be taken off of them, so that I no longer had to endure the embarrasment of seeing my work travested in this manner. The first film that they made of my work was "From Hell" Which was an adaptation of my "Jack the Ripper" narrative … In which they replaced my gruff Dorset police constable with Johnny Depp's Absinthe-swigging dandy. The next film to be made from one of my books was the regrettable "League of Extraordinary Gentlemen"… Where the only resemblence it had to my book was a similar title. The most recent film that they have made of mine is apparently this new "V for Vendetta" movie which was probably the final straw between me and Hollywood. They were written to be impossible to reproduce in terms of cinema, and so why not leave them simply as a comic in the way that they were intended to be. And if you are going to make them into films, please try to make them into better ones, than the ones I have been cursed with thus far."

"Martin credits his experience in Hollywood for helping him hold out, saying that many of his fellow novelists end up in a situation where their books are changed dramatically. “Some of them come out of the premieres looking like their children have been gassed...but I can’t think of anyone other than Alan Moore who’s returned a check,” he says."