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Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
How strange is the lot of us mortals! Each of us is here for a brief sojourn; for what purpose […]
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Barbara Smoker (1923-2020)
To say that “God moves in mysterious ways” is to put up a smokescreen of mystery behind which fantasy may […]
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Barbara Wootton (1897-1988)
It is in fact a strength, not a weakness, of a secular morality that it must stand upon its own […]
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Bertrand Russell (1872-1970)
The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge. Neither love without knowledge, nor knowledge without love […]
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Bessie Mabbs (1873-1953)
Bessie Mabbs was a teacher, school principal, and active member of the Union of Ethical Societies (now Humanists UK), chairing […]
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Bill Bynner (1900-1984)
Bill Bynner was a humanist, socialist, and civil servant. As the editor of South Place Ethical Society‘s Ethical Record wrote […]
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Clementina Anstruther-Thomson (1857-1921)
I for one don’t believe in looking regretfully back into the past or forward with illusive hopes into the future, […]
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Conscientious Objectors’ Commemorative Stone
To all those who have established and who are maintaining the right to refuse to kill. Their foresight and courage […]
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Dora Russell (1894-1986)
I see this kind of love – the empathy that should be common to all living creatures – rather than […]
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Doris Lessing (1919–2013)
I lost religion in a breath; Heaven fled from me on the wings of Reason… Doris Lessing, Under My Skin: […]
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E. M. Forster (1879-1970)
Humanism could (better) be honoured by reciting a list of the things one has enjoyed or found interesting, of the […]
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Eleanor Rathbone (1872-1946)
Only victory will put an end to it all. But meantime let no one say: ‘We are not responsible.’ We […]
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Eslanda Goode Robeson (1895–1965)
I am willing and eager to surrender as much of my personal sovereignty as is necessary, in order to secure […]
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Fenner Brockway (1888-1988)
I had long put on one side the purist pacifist view that one should have nothing to do with a […]
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First Universal Races Congress
To those who regard the furtherance of International Good Will and Peace as the highest of all human interests, the […]
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Francis Sheehy-Skeffington (1878–1916)
A distinctively Edwardian rationalist radical, he himself agreed that he was a crank – ‘a small instrument that makes revolutions’. […]
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From the archives: Vera Brittain’s toast to the Rationalist Press Association (1935)
I think that one of the most hopeful signs at the present day, and one for which this Movement can […]
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George Peabody Gooch (1873–1968)
Conscience is older than any existing Church or creed. George Peabody Gooch, Under Six Reigns (1958) George Peabody Gooch was […]
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Gilbert Murray (1866-1957)
But in the more civilised communities, as in ancient Greece, there has always been a minority who, through some speculative […]
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Gustav Spiller (1864-1940)
The Conscience has eclipsed the Scriptures; Science has destroyed the belief in Divine Interposition; Democracy and Civism have shown men […]
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Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington (1877-1946)
Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington was an activist, feminist, and humanist, who founded the Irish Women’s Franchise League, and was described by the […]
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Harold John Blackham (1903-2009)
Faith without works is not Christianity, and unbelief without any effort to help shoulder the consequences for mankind is not […]
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Harold Pinter (1930-2008)
Good writing excites me, and makes life worth living. Harold Pinter Harold Pinter was one of the 20th century’s most […]
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Helena Swanwick (1864-1939)
Life would be far more truly envisaged if we dropped the silly phrases “men’s and women’s questions”; for indeed there […]
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Henry Noel Brailsford (1873–1958)
Our goal must be the good of the whole human society. Henry Noel Brailsford, Olives of Endless Age: being a […]
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Humanists International
Humanists International was formed in 1952 as the International Humanist and Ethical Union (IHEU): a federation of the American Ethical […]
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Hypatia Bradlaugh Bonner (1858-1935)
When we are asked to believe that nothing but a supernatural ideal can inspire and sustain a life-time of complete […]
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Jack McDowell (1923-2006)
Belfast-born Jack McDowell was an activist, educator, politician, and atheist, whose humanism was evident in a lifetime of work for […]
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James Baldwin (1924-1987)
If the concept of God has any validity or any use, it can only be to make us larger, freer, […]
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Jane Ellen Harrison (1850-1928)
About the moral problem there is nothing mysterious; it is simply the old, old question of how best to live […]
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Jawaharlal Nehru (1889–1964)
Essentially, I am interested in this world, in this life, not in some other world or a future life. Whether […]
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John Boyd Orr (1880–1971)
The big problem of today is how shall we adjust these tremendous new forces so that they can be harnessed […]
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John Galsworthy (1867–1933)
…the only efficient, the only decent prayer, is Action. John Galsworthy, ‘Philosophy of Life’ in Glimpses and Reflections (1937) Best […]
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Josephine Gowa (1854-1941)
Josephine Gowa was an active member of the Hampstead Ethical Institute (later Hampstead Humanist Society) for over three decades, many […]
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Julian Huxley (1887-1975)
What the sciences discover about the natural world and about the origins, nature and destiny of man is the truth […]
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Kingsley Martin (1897-1969)
I believe in the supreme virtue of exploring. I believe in finding out. Even if I don’t succeed, I still […]
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Laurence Housman (1865-1959)
But however little it conforms or tenders allegiance, no life worth having can be isolated from the lives of others. […]
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Lilian Sauter 1864-1924
Lift the heart to high endeavour! Fire the thought and nerve the will! Though the bonds be hard to sever, […]
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Lillie Boileau (1869-1930)
Lillie Boileau was a devoted figure within the Ethical movement, and an active part of the fight for women’s suffrage. […]
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Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948)
The international significance and reputation of Mohandas Gandhi is well-known, but his involvement with the burgeoning humanist movement during the […]
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Mary Sheepshanks (1872-1960)
Mary Sheepshanks was a humanist who saw her feminist, pacifist, and cosmopolitan beliefs as being natural expressions of her humanist […]
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Michael Manley (1924–1997)
I like life with its mysteries. I don’t need my imponderables filled in for me. Michael Manley quoted by Rachel […]
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Michael Tippett (1905-1998)
A wide-ranging Humanism will always seek to extend to more and more people, through education and opportunity, the enrichment of […]
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Mona Caird (1854–1932)
Belief in the power of man to choose his direction of change: this is the creed of the future, and […]
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Moncure Conway (1832-1907)
It is not because the believer in rational religion has not clear convictions that he will not shape them into […]
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Nicolas Walter (1934-2000)
Humanism involves not just the deletion of God from moral thought, but the development of humanity on a rational and […]
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Ouida (1839-1908)
[Ouida’s] exaggerated enthusiasms made readers smile, but they also made them think. It would be difficult to overstate the effect […]
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Peace Pledge Union
We are living in critical days. It is not enough to desire peace or to talk peace. We must make […]
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Presidents of Humanists UK
Humanists UK began as the Union of Ethical Societies in 1896, becoming the Ethical Union in 1920, the British Humanist […]
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Rationalist Peace Society
…a slowly growing public opinion in favour of arbitration as the alternative to war… is not in consequence of any […]
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Red Lion Square
As well as being home to Conway Hall and its humanist library, Red Lion Square contains statues of two prominent […]
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Social Morality Council
Without this mutual trust and dependability amongst people who differ radically, there cannot be political and religious freedom. H.J. Blackham […]
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Storm Jameson (1891-1986)
I hold that a writer should not in any circumstances or for any cause surrender his duty to criticise and […]
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Sylvia Pankhurst (1882-1960)
Against the militarist totalitarian state, I have striven. For the freedom of the human spirit to develop under the kindly […]
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The Ethical Movement
Not by the Creed but by the Deed. Motto of the Society for Ethical Culture of New York, founded in […]
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UNESCO
Its main concern is with peace and security and with human welfare, in so far as they can be subserved […]
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W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963)
If living does not give value, wisdom and meaning to life, then there is no sense in living at all. […]
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Winifred Holtby (1898-1935)
The attempt to create communities where men and women alike share the full stature of humanity is an attempt to […]
