Thomas Edison

We don't know a millionth of one percent about anything.

It is very beautiful over there!

We really haven't got any great amount of data on the subject, and without data how can we reach any definite conclusions? All we have — everything — favors the idea of what religionists call the "Hereafter." Science, if it ever learns the …

I believe in the existence of a Supreme Intelligence pervading the Universe.

The memory of Tom Paine will outlive all this. No man who helped to lay the foundations of our liberty — who stepped forth as the champion of so difficult a cause — can be permanently obscured by such attacks. Tom Paine should be read by …

The torch which he handed on will not be extinguished.

His Bible was the open face of nature, the broad skies, the green hills. He disbelieved the ancient myths and miracles taught by established creeds.

He has been called an atheist, but atheist he was not.

Many a person who could not comprehend Rousseau, and would be puzzled by Montesquieu, could understand Paine as an open book.

It is probable that we should have had the Revolution without Tom Paine. Certainly it could not be forestalled, once he had spoken.

In 'Common Sense' Paine flared forth with a document so powerful that the Revolution became inevitable. Washington recognized the difference, and in his calm way said that matters never could be the same again..

Few men, indeed, had thought in terms of war. Then Paine wrote 'Common Sense,' an anonymous tract which immediately stirred the fires of liberty.

Looking back to those times we cannot, without much reading, clearly gauge the sentiment of the Colonies.

I consider Paine our greatest political thinker. As we have not advanced, and perhaps never shall advance, beyond the Declaration and Constitution, so Paine has had no successors who extended his principles.

We never had a sounder intelligence in this Republic. He was the equal of Washington in making American liberty possible.

Tom Paine has almost no influence on present-day thinking in the United States because he is unknown to the average citizen.

Music on the radio is very poor because it is badly distorted ... I quite approve of radios but they should not be used for musical purposes. They are good for news and for reports of ball games, boxing matches and speeches, where …

My mind is incapable of conceiving such a thing as a soul. I may be in error, and man may have a soul; but I simply do not believe it. What a soul may be is beyond my understanding.

Sunshine is a form of energy, and the winds and the tides are manifestations of energy. Do we use them? Oh, no; we burn up wood and coal, as renters burn up the front fence for fuel. We live like squatters, not as if we owned the property.

This scheme of combustion to get power makes me sick to think of — it is so wasteful.

Some day some fellow will invent a way of concentrating and storing up sunshine to use instead of this old, absurd Prometheus scheme of fire.

Nature is what we know. We do not know the gods of religions. And nature is not kind, or merciful, or loving. If God made me — the fabled God of the three qualities of which I spoke: mercy, kindness, love — He also made the fish I catch …

Genius is one percent inspiration, ninety-nine percent perspiration.

Hell! There ain't no rules around here! We are tryin' to accomplish somep'n!