Henry Drummond

The fact that a believer is happier than a sceptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one. The happiness of credulity is a cheap and dangerous quality.

No man ever prayed heartily without learning something.

I have never taken any exercise except sleeping and resting.

Independence? That’s middle class blasphemy. We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on earth.

Gossip is a sort of smoke that comes from the dirty tobacco-pipes of those who diffuse it: it proves nothing but the bad taste of the smoker.

I gleaned jests at home from obsolete farces.

The Holy Roman Empire is neither Holy, nor Roman, nor an Empire.

A crime persevered in a thousand centuries ceases to be a crime, and becomes a virtue. This is the law of custom, and custom supersedes all other forms of law.

Nobody’s free until everybody’s free.

A round man cannot be expected to fit in a square hole right away. He must have time to modify his shape.

The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost the power of reason.

In the stillness of the mind I saw myself as I am – unbound.

For too long I have silenced my heart, that now, when I give it the opportunity to speak, it no longer remembers its voice. Locked away, it forgot what it’s like to be free; to roam. Imprisoned within loneliness, I fear Stockholm syndrome has developed.

Rare virtues are like rare plants or animals, things that have not been able to hold their own in the world. A virtue to be serviceable must, like gold, be alloyed with some commoner but more durable metal.

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist.