Considerations by the Way
1860s, The Conduct of Life (1860)
Source: Sociology For The South: Or The Failure Of A Free Society (1854), p. 69
1880s, The Sentiment of Rationality (1882)
Ainsi est-il du cœur de l’homme. Le besoin de faire œuvre qui dure, qui lui survive, est le signe de sa supériorité sur tout ce qui vit ici-bas. C’est ce qui a fondé sa domination, et c’est ce qui la justifie dans le monde entier.
Part III, ch. XV
The Mysterious Island (1874)
Letter http://eText.Lib.Virginia.edu/etcbin/toccer-new2?id=JefLett.sgm&images=images/modeng&data=/texts/english/modeng/parsed&tag=public&part=136&division=div1 to Dr. Joseph Priestley (21 March 1801); published in The Life of Thomas Jefferson (1871) by Henry Stephens Randall, Vol. 2, p. 644; this seems to be the source of a misleading abbreviation: "[Christianity is] the most … perverted system that ever shone on man".
1800s, First Presidential Administration (1801–1805)
Context: Yours is one of the few lives precious to mankind, and for the continuance of which every thinking man is solicitous. Bigots may be an exception. What an effort, my dear sir, of bigotry in politics and religion have we gone through! The barbarians really flattered themselves they should be able to bring back the times of Vandalism, when ignorance put everything into the hands of power and priestcraft. All advances in science were proscribed as innovations. They pretended to praise and encourage education, but it was to be the education of our ancestors. We were to look backwards, not forwards, for improvement … This was the real ground of all the attacks on you. Those who live by mystery & charlatanerie, fearing you would render them useless by simplifying the Christian philosophy — the most sublime and benevolent, but most perverted system that ever shone on man — endeavored to crush your well-earned & well-deserved fame.
“Every man's last day is fixed.
Lifetimes are brief and not to be regained,
For all mankind. But by their deeds to make
Their fame last: that is labor for the brave.”
Stat sua cuique dies, breve et inreparabile tempus
Omnibus est vitae; sed famam extendere factis,
Hoc virtutis opus.
Source: Aeneid (29–19 BC), Book X, Lines 467–469 (tr. Robert Fitzgerald)
Source: Gospel of Barnabas (c. 16th century AD manuscript), Ch. 33. The gospel's origins and author have been debated; several theories are speculative, and none has general acceptance. The Gospel of Barnabas is dated to the 13th to 15th centuries,[2] much too late to have been written by Barnabas (fl. 1st century CE). Many of its teachings are synchronous with those in the Quran and oppose the Bible, especially the New Testament; some, however, contradict the Quran.
