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The first Presbyterian was a heretic. The first Baptist was a…

Quote byRobert Green Ingersoll · 1833–1899

Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: My Reviewers Reviewed (lecture from June 27, 1877, San Francisco, CA).

English (original)

The first Presbyterian was a heretic. The first Baptist was a heretic. The first Congregationalist was a heretic. The first Christian was denounced as a blasphemer. And yet these heretics, the moment they get numerous enough to be in the majority in some locality, begin to call themselves orthodox. Can there be any impudence beyond this?

— Robert Green Ingersoll

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