"Free-thinking" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... their beards gravely as they spoke of the event, deeming it a certain presage of civil commotions. It was remembered that at the outbreak of the great war two whales had been washed ashore in the Scheldt. Although some free-thinking people were inclined to ascribe the phenomenon to a prevalence of strong westerly gales, while others found proof in it of a superabundance of those creatures in the Polar seas, which should rather give encouragement to the Dutch and Zealand fisheries, it is probable that quite as dark forebodings ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... are undoubtedly! Free-thinking, stump-orator, have-your-rights sort of creatures. You don't know anything about them, Miss Gueldmar—be thankful! Now, Phil, how long is this vessel of yours going to ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... well in Paris was Necker. His wife had very possibly begun by this time her rather austere salon, where free-thinking was strictly tabooed, and Morellet, her right-hand man in the entertainment of the guests, confesses the restraint was really irksome; and if she had, Morellet would probably have brought Smith there. But ...
— Life of Adam Smith • John Rae
... Fellow of Trinity, A Doctor well versed in divinity; But he took to free-thinking, And then to deep drinking, And so had to leave ...
— Collections and Recollections • George William Erskine Russell
... an old Keilhau boy, "in the State the exercise of a boundless arbitrary power, in the Church dark intolerance." It must have been an easy matter to bring charges of revolutionary doctrines against the man who said so innocently, "But I,—I only wanted to train up free-thinking, independent men." ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith
... pleased with slaughter, thirsty of human blood, and capable of requiring or accepting such offerings? Religion, says this judicious author,(526) is placed between two rocks, that are equally dangerous to man, and injurious to the deity, I mean impiety and superstition. The one, from an affectation of free-thinking, believes nothing; and the other, from a blind weakness, believes all things. Impiety, to rid itself of a terror which galls it, denies the very existence of the gods: whilst superstition, to calm its fears, capriciously ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... world of thought. Having set right the health of the British Army, she would now do the same good service for the religious convictions of mankind. She had long noticed—with regret—the growing tendency towards free-thinking among artisans. With regret, but not altogether with surprise, the current teaching of Christianity was sadly to seek; nay, Christianity itself was not without its defects. She would rectify these errors. She would correct the mistakes of the Churches; ...
— Eminent Victorians • Lytton Strachey |
