June suns, you cannot store them To warm the winter’s cold, The lad that hopes for heaven Shall fill his […]
In common with other humanists, I believe that the only possible basis for a sound morality is mutual tolerance and […]
Adam Duff O’Toole (Adam Dubh Ó Tuathail) was a reputed heretic, who was burned at the stake for his denials […]
Fanny Adela Coit was a suffragist and campaigner of international significance, as well as a central figure in the Ethical […]
We can only see a short distance ahead, but we can see plenty there that needs to be done. Alan […]
How strange is the lot of us mortals! Each of us is here for a brief sojourn; for what purpose […]
…for a long time, like the philosophers of old, I was trying to find indisputable foundations. How long it took […]
By Steve Ratcliff Steve has been researching humanists from LGBT history, focusing on digitised materials from the archives of LGBT […]
Every movement requires its handful of pioneers who are prepared to stand up and be counted — to be abused, […]
Dr Alice Vickery was a humanist, physician, and devoted champion of women’s reproductive rights. Her tombstone inscription remembers her as […]
Alice Woods was an educationist and headteacher; a member of the Hampstead Ethical Institute, and a proponent of moral education. […]
He was a great humanist whose religion lay in loving his fellow men and trying to serve them. These are […]
Anna was not a religious person. As a humanist, she believed in the goodness of people and their ability to […]
Women, like men, should try to do the impossible. And when they fail, their failure should be a challenge to […]
Is being rewarded for maintaining certain articles as matters of faith, and being punished, or suffering for opposing them, proper […]
Antony Flew was a British philosopher and was, for much of his life, a renowned atheist and eloquent proponent of […]
By Mia Nathan Constantly having to combat irrational and dangerous thinking is strenuous and sometimes tedious, but not necessarily boring. […]
…that perfect Tranquility of Life, which is no where to be found, but in retreat, a faithful Friend and a […]
Auguste Comte was a French writer, philosopher, and social scientist, whose theory of positivism was a significant influence on the […]
To say that “God moves in mysterious ways” is to put up a smokescreen of mystery behind which fantasy may […]
It is in fact a strength, not a weakness, of a secular morality that it must stand upon its own […]
The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge. Neither love without knowledge, nor knowledge without love […]
Bessie Braddock was a trade union activist and politician, who devoted her life to improving the lives of others. She […]
Bessie Mabbs was a teacher, school principal, and active member of the Union of Ethical Societies (now Humanists UK), chairing […]
William Pirrie Barbour was a classicist, codebreaker, teacher, and activist. A rationalist and humanist, Barbour championed integrated education in his […]
Bill Bynner was a humanist, socialist, and civil servant. As the editor of South Place Ethical Society‘s Ethical Record wrote […]
To summarise why I have become a rationalist is a difficult task for one not educated in formal writing, but […]
We are (of all the synonyms I most prefer to ‘humanist’) freethinkers. We are deprived of nothing. We have lost […]
If he had ever worshipped at any shrine, it would have been one illumined with the flame of pure intellect. […]
Chapman Cohen was a tireless champion of freethought, and a prolific writer and lecturer for the secularist cause. President of […]
Charles Albert Watts was a lifelong promoter of rationalism, and the founder in 1885 of Watts’s Literary Guide, still published […]
Charles Bradlaugh was a leading freethinker, secularist, and founder of the National Secular Society. His efforts to take his seat […]
I cannot pretend to throw the least light on such abstruse problems. The mystery of the beginning of all things […]
… in broad terms, with our lecturers we attempt to define our intellectual standpoint; with our music we try to […]
Avoiding alike mysticism and shallow denial, he was a true Agnostic, anxious not merely to beat down error, but to […]
Chrysippus (or Chrysippos) of Soli was a Greek Stoic philosopher. Although Chrysippus believed in fate, divination, and gods, he believed […]
The writer, TV and radio personality and social campaigner, Claire Rayner, best known for her agony aunt columns, spent most […]
I have adhered to such of the older traditions as I find adequate for my most lawless and revolutionary passions […]
…having now exceeded the age of three score years and ten, I would say that up to the present I […]
I for one don’t believe in looking regretfully back into the past or forward with illusive hopes into the future, […]
In all her work for the humanist movement, Constance Dowman said little and did much… She was one of the […]
…the only universal truths which exist are the fundamental laws of the mind. Philosophy, then, which is the science of […]
Without any great effort of thought, I believe that I could, in an instant, propose other systems of cosmogony, which […]
David Pollock was a towering figure in the humanist movement. A longtime member, activist, trustee, and former Chair, he was […]
I was educated among the Saints; and I now live, thank God, among Sinners. David Williams, Essays on Public Worship […]
Everywhere man blames nature and fate yet his fate is mostly but the echo of his character and passion, his […]
Derek Lennard was a longtime member and former chair of LGBT Humanists—then known as the Gay and Lesbian Humanist Group […]
I see this kind of love – the empathy that should be common to all living creatures – rather than […]
I lost religion in a breath; Heaven fled from me on the wings of Reason… Doris Lessing, Under My Skin: […]
No law can be effective which has not behind it the sanction of the people. Dorothy Thurtle, quoted by David […]
Isn’t it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the […]
Humanism could (better) be honoured by reciting a list of the things one has enjoyed or found interesting, of the […]
The woman artist appears quickly to have grasped the fact that she cannot maintain an isolated and merely selfish point […]
“Yet, upon the whole, the History of the Decline and Fall seems to have struck root, both at home and […]
The radical publisher Edward Truelove found himself in court more than once defending freedom of belief and expression. He believed, […]
Because no one will believe without a splash from a fontTheir baby will howl in eternal cold, or fire,And no […]
Only victory will put an end to it all. But meantime let no one say: ‘We are not responsible.’ We […]
Elhanan Winchester was the first minister of the dissenting congregation that eventually became the humanist South Place Ethical Society in […]
Eliza Flower was a composer, a radical, and a significant influence on William Johnson Fox and the progressive values of […]
Elizabeth Swann was an active and devoted champion of liberal and progressive causes alongside her husband, Liberal MP Charles Swann. […]
… purely human and natural ethics, and not theology, was the source of this pioneer woman’s enthusiasm for justice, even […]
Her beautiful life, her truth, her unwearied charities, proceeded from her own heart. They were not inspired by any thought […]
Emilie Holyoake-Marsh, daughter of George Jacob Holyoake, was an activist for worker’s rights and women’s suffrage; an advocate of co-operation, […]
Emily Josephine Troup was a composer, poet, and editor, who played a leading role in the musical life of South […]
Oh what a tissue of inconsistencies are the dogmas in which we have been reared! Emma Martin, God’s Gifts and […]
… a man who thinks himself bound to all offices of Humanity. Ephraim Chambers, self-composed epitaph Ephraim Chambers was an […]
For I am not everlasting, but a human being, a part of the whole as an hour is a part […]
There is nothing to fear from Gods, nothing awaiting us in death; good can be obtained, evil fortune can be […]
Ernestine Mills, an enamelist, and her husband Dr. Herbert Henry Mills were both active members of the Ethical movement, and […]
Emancipation from every kind of bondage is my principle. I go for the recognition of human rights, without distinction of […]
I am willing and eager to surrender as much of my personal sovereignty as is necessary, in order to secure […]
Ethel Leach was a Liberal councillor, social reformer, justice of the peace, and the first female mayor of Great Yarmouth. […]
In order to find meaning to one’s life, one must find a meaning in the life of the [human] race. […]
I had long put on one side the purist pacifist view that one should have nothing to do with a […]
No one who came in contact with her failed to recognize in her fearlessness, honesty for the sake of honesty […]
A cheerful and reverent Agnostic, whose whole life was one of unselfishness and devotion to lofty aims, who was tolerant […]
I have never believed in any formal religion, but I have experienced an emotion that seemed to me religious. In […]
I have devoted my time and fortune to laying the foundation of a society where affection shall form the only […]
Francis Crick discovered the structure of DNA, the biological molecule of hereditary information, and cracked the genetic code by which […]
A distinctively Edwardian rationalist radical, he himself agreed that he was a crank – ‘a small instrument that makes revolutions’. […]
F.J. Gould was an influential educationist, writer, and humanist, whose tireless work towards secularising education helped to lay the groundwork […]
The tremendous influence of Moore and his book on us came from the fact that they suddenly removed from our […]
George Broadhead was a humanist activist and gay rights campaigner, motivated by a twin commitment to humanism and human rights. […]
What do we live for, if it is not to make life less difficult for each other? George Eliot, Middlemarch […]
Free thought means fearless thought. It is not deterred by legal penalties, nor by spiritual consequences. Dissent from the Bible […]
I don’t understand people panicking about death. It’s inevitable. I’m an atheist; you’d think it would make it worse, but […]
You can always appeal to common decency, which the vast majority of people believe in without the need to tie […]
Conscience is older than any existing Church or creed. George Peabody Gooch, Under Six Reigns (1958) George Peabody Gooch was […]
Doubt is the beginning of wisdom. It means caution, independence, honesty and veracity. G. W. Foote George William Foote was […]
But in the more civilised communities, as in ancient Greece, there has always been a minority who, through some speculative […]
Godlessness is negative. It merely denies the existence of god. Atheism is positive. It asserts the condition that results from […]
Mr. Fysher was in many respects a remarkable man. His interests were wide, and whatever he took up he carried […]
The Conscience has eclipsed the Scriptures; Science has destroyed the belief in Divine Interposition; Democracy and Civism have shown men […]
Harford Montgomery Hyde was a Belfast-born barrister, politician, author, and humanist, who championed humane legal reforms and progressive social attitudes. […]
Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington was an activist, feminist, and humanist, who founded the Irish Women’s Franchise League, and was described by the […]
Life is a wonderful privilege. It imposes great duties. It demands the fulfilment of great tasks and the realisation of […]
Faith without works is not Christianity, and unbelief without any effort to help shoulder the consequences for mankind is not […]
Good writing excites me, and makes life worth living. Harold Pinter Harold Pinter was one of the 20th century’s most […]
Harriet Law was a secularist and speaker, who also promoted women’s rights and socialist ideals. During the 1870s, Law’s house […]
What an emancipation it is, — to have escaped from the little enclosure of dogma, and to stand, — far […]
That an institution or a practice is customary in no presumption of its goodness. Harriet Taylor Mill Harriet Taylor Mill […]
Harry Snell was a socialist politician and campaigner, a devoted advocate of the Ethical Movement and a key figure in […]
Harry Stopes-Roe was one of the most tireless and dedicated humanist campaigners of the 20th century. Son of the influential […]
Humanism is less concerned with what to believe than with how to live. The meaning it gives to life lies […]
Life would be far more truly envisaged if we dropped the silly phrases “men’s and women’s questions”; for indeed there […]
I have ever considered that the only religion useful to man consists exclusively of the practice of morality, and in […]
Our goal must be the good of the whole human society. Henry Noel Brailsford, Olives of Endless Age: being a […]
I felt flattered by the remark of a hostile journalist that I was “a compendium of the cranks,” by which […]
No one can be perfectly free till all are free; no one can be perfectly moral till all are moral; […]
It is in service to others, it is as members of the community, that our existence lies. Hermann Bondi, Humanism […]
Hilda Caroline Miall-Smith was a teacher and activist, a graduate of University College London, and a member of the London […]
When we are asked to believe that nothing but a supernatural ideal can inspire and sustain a life-time of complete […]
Belfast-born Jack McDowell was an activist, educator, politician, and atheist, whose humanism was evident in a lifetime of work for […]
The notion that a man shall judge for himself what he is told, sifting the evidence and weighing the conclusions, […]
If the concept of God has any validity or any use, it can only be to make us larger, freer, […]
The difference and variety of our human family more and more seems to me to be a wise provision that […]
The time has arrived for us humans to stop leaning on ideas for a creator god; we should get down […]
The moral value of a belief in eternal life is a doubtful matter. But this is certain, that where rest […]
About the moral problem there is nothing mysterious; it is simply the old, old question of how best to live […]
If the church was wrong, as of old, to trust to prayer in an epidemic, why shall she be right […]
Essentially, I am interested in this world, in this life, not in some other world or a future life. Whether […]
Jennie Lee (also known as Baroness Lee of Asheridge) was a Scottish politician and journalist, known for her upfront orating […]
It is impossible that Theology can throw any light upon either morality or jurisprudence. Jeremy Bentham Philosopher and jurist Jeremy […]
Humanism is a way to live, to give meaning to life and to find an understanding of our place in […]
I believe in the absolute equality of the sexes, and I think they [women] should be in the enjoyment of […]
We can’t help the universe, but at least we can do something to help ourselves. Can’t we? John Boyd, Across […]
The big problem of today is how shall we adjust these tremendous new forces so that they can be harnessed […]
John Curry was an English figure skater celebrated for revolutionising the sport by combining athleticism with balletic artistry. Openly gay […]
I think I was born a humanist. John D. Stewart, The Honest Ulsterman, May 1968 John D. Stewart was a […]
…the only efficient, the only decent prayer, is Action. John Galsworthy, ‘Philosophy of Life’ in Glimpses and Reflections (1937) Best […]
Throughout his life, Professor of Philosophy, John Muirhead, sought to put his ethical principles into practice. Indeed, whilst philosophers are […]
I fear their creed as we have always fearedthe lifted hand against unfettered thought. John Hewitt, ‘The Glens’ in Collected […]
Words ought to be a little wild, for they are the assault of thoughts upon the unthinking. J.M. Keynes in […]
In the beginning natural philosophers tried to understand the world around them. Trying to do that they hit upon the […]
I will call no being good, who is not what I mean when I apply that epithet to my fellow-creatures; […]
Virtue alone is enough to live happily and brings its own reward. John Toland, Pantheisticon (1720) John Toland was an […]
All religious theories, schemes and systems, which embrace notions of cosmogony, or which otherwise reach into the domain of science, […]
Josephine Gowa was an active member of the Hampstead Ethical Institute (later Hampstead Humanist Society) for over three decades, many […]
Josiah Gimson was the most prosperous of the 19th century secularists in Leicester, and the main force behind the building […]
Julia Huxley was a feminist and freethinker, who profoundly influenced a generation of girls who attended the school she founded […]
Purity of life, sincerity of action, obedience to law, love of our fellow creatures, all those qualities which ennoble life […]
What the sciences discover about the natural world and about the origins, nature and destiny of man is the truth […]
Can there be a more important human condition than dignity? Without it, we are bitter, downtrodden, unheard, humiliated, embarrassed and […]
… the responsibility for our ethical decisions is entirely ours and cannot be shifted to anybody else; neither to God, […]
Now art, certainly literary art, is ‘existential’ and has to be so. It is, if nothing else, about the real […]
I believe in the supreme virtue of exploring. I believe in finding out. Even if I don’t succeed, I still […]
Harriet Martineau described her escape to atheism like this: “I lingered long on the stages of speculation and taste, but […]
It lies within our power, if we so desire it, to make the familiar world we inhabit more worthy of […]
Those who, like myself, are in communication with the advanced thought and thinkers throughout the world know that hundreds —nay, […]
I have come to feel that the best proof of the subjection and degradation of my sex lies in the […]
But however little it conforms or tenders allegiance, no life worth having can be isolated from the lives of others. […]
It was the start of opening up society to be more caring and sensitive. One was battling for all men […]
Why not agree to differ about the questions which no one denies to be all but insoluble, and become allies […]
Lift the heart to high endeavour! Fire the thought and nerve the will! Though the bonds be hard to sever, […]
Lillie Boileau was a devoted figure within the Ethical movement, and an active part of the fight for women’s suffrage. […]
It is essential to get it recognised that good and graceful living is sufficient in itself; further, that this is […]
It has been suggested that matter is capable of destruction, that every atom is destined to be dissolved away in […]
We hold that only by making happiness for those around us, and by endeavoring, individually, to make the world a […]
Titus Lucretius Carus was a Roman poet contemporary of Julius Caesar. Little is known of him apart from his name […]
Ludovic Kennedy was a writer, journalist, and broadcaster, known for his investigations into miscarriages of justice. A human rights campaigner, he […]
The realisation of the possibility of a secular rational morality opens up a new perspective before the modern world… It […]
The international significance and reputation of Mohandas Gandhi is well-known, but his involvement with the burgeoning humanist movement during the […]
Margaret Chappellsmith was a devotee of the socialist and secularist ideas of Robert Owen, becoming one of the Owenite movement’s […]
With these basic [humanist] beliefs there go commonly two corollaries. First, that virtue is a matter of promoting human well-being, […]
They weren’t just trying to sell something to parents, they were helping them to understand how to play with and […]
Is it not the duty of every person to promote the happiness of others as much as lies in their […]
The attainment of the greatest possible amount of social happiness I take to be the noblest of human aims; the […]
Mary Sheepshanks was a humanist who saw her feminist, pacifist, and cosmopolitan beliefs as being natural expressions of her humanist […]
And how can woman be expected to co-operate unless she knows why she ought to be virtuous? Unless freedom strengthens […]
I will never voluntarily obey any law which is an outrage on human reason. Matilda Roalfe Matilda Roalfe was an […]
Hath man no second life? Pitch this one high! Sits there no judge in Heaven our sin to see? More […]
If the basic cause of an unsuccessful marriage is removable, conciliation is the proper procedure. If it is not removable, […]
I like life with its mysteries. I don’t need my imponderables filled in for me. Michael Manley quoted by Rachel […]
A wide-ranging Humanism will always seek to extend to more and more people, through education and opportunity, the enrichment of […]
Millicent Mackenzie was a pioneering educationist and suffragist, who – alongside her husband, John Stuart Mackenzie – gave significant support […]
Belief in the power of man to choose his direction of change: this is the creed of the future, and […]
It is not because the believer in rational religion has not clear convictions that he will not shape them into […]
As for Mother Clap, she was present all the Time, except when she went out to fetch Liquors… The Company […]
Nellie Freeman was an indefatigable organiser within the Ethical Union (today’s Humanists UK) for decades of her life. Beginning in […]
Humanism involves not just the deletion of God from moral thought, but the development of humanity on a rational and […]
Nina Spiller was a lifelong worker for women’s rights, who played an active role in the humanist movement for more […]
…life itself offers enough explanation for living; and believing our existence to finish with death, we naturally make the most […]
[Ouida’s] exaggerated enthusiasms made readers smile, but they also made them think. It would be difficult to overstate the effect […]
I am a humanist, a rationalist. My mother said to me, some weeks before she died, that she would die ‘an unrepentant […]
Pelagius lived between the fourth and fifth centuries, and advocated a heretical Christianity that emphasised free will and humanity’s capacity […]
Percy Bysshe Shelley was a major poet of the Romantic period, and remains one of England’s best loved and most […]
I have been the more bold in exposing my opinion because I believe it to be the dictates of truth […]
Humanists believe that this is our world, our responsibility, our possibility. If you agree, would anyone know? Peter Draper, ‘Values […]
Indian social and religious reformer Rammohun Roy is sometimes referred to as the ‘father of modern India’: a progressive thinker, […]
I have no view but public good; certainly no desire to injure any one, but a passionate desire to do […]
Richard Congreve was a devoted follower of Auguste Comte, whose positivist philosophies and ‘Religion of Humanity’ inspired Congreve to open […]
But this much is certain, that, taking the world as we find it, sympathy, plus a modicum of common sense […]
Humanist ethics, as I understand them, are concerned with mankind. As humanists we believe in reason, but we also believe […]
Robert Owen was a utopian socialist, philanthropist, and reformer, whose own religious scepticism fostered his desire for a secular society, […]
There is no one who will deny the value and importance of truth, but how is it to be ascertained, […]
The obituary reproduced below was written by George Broadhead, and originally appeared in a 1997 issue of The Gay Humanist […]
I agree that faith is essential to success in life (success of any sort) but I do not accept your […]
Rose Bush was a member of the South Place Ethical Society for over 50 years, and a driving force in […]
Ruth Homan was an educationist, women’s welfare campaigner, and one of the founding members of the West London Ethical Society […]
Universal rights are exactly that, universal, and one should not suddenly acquire different rights after a certain number of birthdays. […]
Man for man in larger sense does what heaven fails to do. Sara A. Underwood, quoted by Rufus K. Noyes […]
Sarah Flower Adams was a writer, radical, and major influence on the religious thinking of William Johnson Fox at South […]
If after this survey of the nature of illusions and delusions, we turn again to religious doctrines, we may reiterate […]
Sophie Bryant was an Anglo-Irish mathematician, feminist, suffragist, teacher, and promoter of moral education. She played a key role in […]
Stanton Coit was a pioneer of the Ethical movement in England and the founder of the West London Ethical Society, […]
What is this ban on abortion? It is a sexual taboo, it is the terror that women should experiment and […]
I hold that a writer should not in any circumstances or for any cause surrender his duty to criticise and […]
I have no desire… to bring the religion or the laws of this country into contempt, although I am a […]
Against the militarist totalitarian state, I have striven. For the freedom of the human spirit to develop under the kindly […]
The actress turned campaigner and human rights activist Sylvia Scaffardi was a co-founder of The Council of Civil Liberties, along […]
I am a feminist, a rebel, and a suffragist – a believer, therefore, in sex-equality and militant action. I desire […]
There is no hope but us. There is no mercy but us. There is no justice. There is just us… […]
It is a principle innate and co-natural to every man to have an insatiable inclination to the truth and to […]
Thomas Hardy was an English novelist and poet, renowned for his apparently bleak outlook, but finely tuned to life and […]
Thomas Henry Huxley was a man of science, a biologist, and educator. He helped to transform scientific study into a […]
Thomas Hill Green was a philosopher, educator, and a Liberal, whose idealist philosophy (with its practical implications) was a significant […]
And in these four things, opinion of ghosts, ignorance of second causes, devotion towards what men fear, and taking of […]
I believe in the equality of man; and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy and […]
The basic human value is freedom, which means the right of a human being to live a human life. V.M. […]
…the smallest experience is sufficient to convince that it is more pleasing, to be at peace than at enmity with […]
I cling to my tiny philosophy: to hug the present moment. Virginia Woolf, diary entry, 31 January 1940 Virginia Woolf […]
I remain an agnostic, and the practical outcome of agnosticism is that you act as though God did not exist. […]
If living does not give value, wisdom and meaning to life, then there is no sense in living at all. […]
The one thing in which I am interested wholly and completely is the getting to know something about human society […]
William Johnson Fox was an orator, writer, politician, and first minister of South Place Chapel (now Conway Hall) from 1824 […]
Our interest, it seems to me, lies with so much of the past as may serve to guide our actions […]
Fellowship is heaven, and lack of fellowship is hell. William Morris, A Dream of John Ball (1888) Painter, textile designer, artist, […]
William of Ockham was the fourteenth century’s most influential philosopher: a key thinker of the Middle Ages and an early […]
All moral and political wisdom should tend mainly to this, the just distribution of the physical means of happiness. William […]
The attempt to create communities where men and women alike share the full stature of humanity is an attempt to […]
Conscious morality cannot exist in any being except so far as it can look behind, before, and around; and can […]