One of the crudest superstitions is the superstition of the majority of the so-called scientists of our time that a human being can live without faith.
Throughout all ages, people have thirsted to know or at least have some understanding of their origins and of the end goal of their earthly existence, and religion arose to satisfy this need and to illuminate the link that unites the whole of humankind as brothers, who all share a single origin, have a single common task in life and a single common end goal.
— Giuseppe Mazzini
True religion is the relationship established by a human being to the infinite life around him, which connects his life to this infinity and guides his actions.
The essence of any religion consists solely in answering the question: what am I living for and what is my relationship to the infinite world around me? There is not a single religion, from the highest down to the most primitive, which does not have at its foundation this establishment of a human being’s relationship to the world around him.
The religious element is the highest and noblest factor in man’s education, the greatest potency in his civilization; while effete creeds and political selfishness are the greatest obstacles to human advance. State-craft and priest-craft are the very opposites of religion. The religious substance is eternal and divine, permeating the human heart wherever it throbs, feels and meditates. The logical result of our researches all point to the identical basis of the great religions, to the one doctrine unfolding, since the dawn of humanity to this day.
Deep at the bottom of all the creeds flows the stream of the one eternal revelation.
Let the Parsee bear his Taavids, the Jew his philacteries, the Christian his cross, and the Moslem his crescent. But let them all remember that these are forms and emblems, while the practical essence is: “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself,” equally emphasized and accentuated by Manu, Zoroaster, Buddha, Abraham, Moses, Socrates, Hillel, Jesus, Paul, Mohammed.
— Maurice Fluegel
The essence of a religion consists not in the content of known doctrines as divine revelations (for this is called theology), but in the content of all our duties in general, as God’s commandments.
— After Kant
The life of a human being without faith is the life of an animal.
