"Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion" Quotes

The whole frame of nature bespeaks an intelligent author; and no rational enquirer can, after serious reflection, suspend his belief a moment with regard to the primary principles of genuine Theism and Religion.

All things in the universe are evidently of a piece. Every thing is adjusted to every thing. One design prevails throughout the whole. And this uniformity leads the mind to acknowledge one author.

The whole is a riddle, an enigma, an inexplicable mystery. Doubt, uncertainty, suspense of judgment appear the only result of our most accurate scrutiny concerning this subject.

If the universe bears a greater likeness to animal bodies and to vegetables, than to the works of human art, it is more probable that its cause resembles the cause of the former than that of the latter.

As the universe, we are persuaded, had a beginning; is it not absurd to employ any hypothesis, in order to account for its order and disposition?

The true system of the heavenly bodies is discovered and ascertained; and the authority of that pretended science, which still retains the epithets of astronomy and astrology, is utterly abolished.

It is a fine observation of an ancient philosopher, who made a distinction between reason and the reasoner; between the original principles of human understanding and the subsequent deductions.

It is only when two species of objects are found to be constantly conjoined, that we can infer the one from the other.

All religious systems, it is confessed, are subject to great and insuperable difficulties.

Throw in a little moral reasoning and you have reached the summit of human wisdom.