“I always tell what I believe. Whether it's true, I'm no more sure than any man.”

The trial of Charles B. Reynolds for blasphemy (1887)
Context: Gentlemen, you can never make me believe — no statute can ever convince me, that there is any infinite Being in this universe who hates an honest man. It is impossible to satisfy me that there is any God, or can be any God, who holds in abhorrence a soul that has the courage to express his thought. Neither can the whole world convince me that any man should be punished, either in this world or in the next, for being candid with his fellow-men. If you send men to the penitentiary for speaking their thoughts, for endeavoring to enlighten their fellows, then the penitentiary will become a place of honor, and the victim will step from it — not stained, not disgraced, but clad in robes of glory.
Let us take one more step.
What is holy, what is sacred? I reply that human happiness is holy, human rights are holy. The body and soul of man — these are sacred. The liberty of man is of far more importance than any book; the rights of man, more sacred than any religion — than any Scriptures, whether inspired or not.
What we want is the truth, and does any one suppose that all of the truth is confined in one book — that the mysteries of the whole world are explained by one volume?
All that is — all that conveys information to man — all that has been produced by the past — all that now exists — should be considered by an intelligent man. All the known truths of this world — all the philosophy, all the poems, all the pictures, all the statues, all the entrancing music — the prattle of babes, the lullaby of mothers, the words of honest men, the trumpet calls to duty — all these make up the bible of the world — everything that is noble and true and free, you will find in this great book.
If we wish to be true to ourselves, — if we wish to benefit our fellow-men — if we wish to live honorable lives — we will give to every other human being every right that we claim for ourselves.

Source: Life, the Universe and Everything

Source: The Book of Sand and Shakespeare's Memory

L 34
Aphorisms (1765-1799), Notebook L (1793-1796)

Space, Time and Gravitation (1920)

Ron English's Fauxlosophy (2016)

[Rex Ryan implores Jets to show leadership, http://espn.go.com/blog/afceast/post/_/id/17315/rex-ryan-implores-jets-to-show-leadership, ESPN, Graham, Tim, September 1, 2010, http://www.webcitation.org/5x45wBbAP, March 9, 2011, March 9, 2011]

(22 January 2005)
Unfit for Mass Consumption (blog entries), 2005
Context: [On test audiences and alternate endings on DVDs] Seeing these two endings, knowing that the studio most likely chose the one that would close the film after polling test audiences, makes me a little ill. What if I did that with my novels? What would you think of me, if I were to so subvert the act of storytelling and mythmaking in an effort to make more money (by, I might add, perverting democracy)? Okay, at the end of Low Red Moon, I can kill Chance, or I can let her live. Which ending do you prefer? Check the box, and let us know. Should Orpheus make it back to the surface without looking to see if Eurydice is truly following him, or should he look? Should the mouse pull the thorn from the lion's paw, or should he mind his own damned business? I can only hope that it is self-evident that this process is as alien and destructive to art as anything ever could be. Yes, I'm sure it makes people more money, and money is nice, but it has very little to do with telling good and true and useful stories.