You observe that philosophers dispute of the same things that we are saying, not that we are following up their tracks, but that they, from the divine announcements of the prophets, imitated the shadow of the corrupted truth.
Minucius Felix
Octavius
Chapter XXXIV
He declared it then to be of such a character as the Pharisees had admitted it, and such as the Lord had Himself maintained it, and such too as the Sadducees refused to believe it—such refusal leading them indeed to an absolute rejection of the whole verity. Nor had the Athenians previously understood Paul to announce any other resurrection. They had, in fact, derided his announcement; but they would have indulged no such derision if they had heard from him nothing but the restoration of the soul, for they would have received that as the very common anticipation of their own native philosophy.
Tertullian
On the Resurrection of the Flesh
Chapter XXXIX
Divine reason, on the contrary, lies in the very pith and marrow of things, not on the surface, and very often is at variance with appearances.
Tertullian
On the Resurrection of the Flesh
Chapter III
It is satisfactory, however, that the no less important philosophy of Pythagoras and Empedocles, and the Plantonists, take the contrary view, and declare the soul to be immortal; affirming, moreover, in a way which most nearly approaches (to our own doctrine), that the soul actually returns into bodies, although not the same bodies, and not even those of human beings invariably: thus Euphorbus is supposed to have passed into Phythagoras, and Homer into a peacock. They firmly pronounced the soul’s renewal to be in a body, (deeming it) more tolerable to change the quality (of the corporeal state) than to deny it wholly: they at least knocked at the door of truth, although they entered not. Thus the world, with all its errors, does not ignore the resurrection of the dead.
Tertullian
On the Resurrection of the Flesh
Chapter I
Truth persuades by teaching, but does not teach by first persuading.
Tertullian
Against the Valentinians
Chapter I
The most basic form of human stupidity is forgetting what we are trying to accomplish.
Frederich Nietzsche
He who has a why to live for can bear almost any how.
Frederich Nietzsche
The humanist’s faith is based on his belief that nonrational causes cause rational beings (humans with minds) who are themselves composed entirely of the nonrational, and yet are somehow able to step outside of that nonrationality and reason to the conclusion that everything is material and therefore nonrational. Yet, if the nonrational material universe is “the whole show,” the humanist could never actually know if he is truly rational or only a nonrational material product with the illusion of rationality.
What is more reasonable to believe, that the nonrational produces the rational; or that a rational being (God) created other rational beings (humans) and a world founded on rational principles that can therefore be understood by these rational beings? The humanist must borrow from the theistic, Christian worldview, which can account for rationality. It is ironic that humanists often accuse Christians of possessing blind faith that the nonrational can produce the rational. Christianity gives birth to science, while humanism only gives birth to blindness.
Bob and Gretchen Passantino
Religion, Truth, and Value without God: Contemporary Atheism Speaks Out in Humanist Manifesto 2000 (Part Two)
The whole modern world has divided itself into Conservatives and Progressives. The business of Progressives is to go on making mistakes. The business of the Conservatives is to prevent the mistakes from being corrected.
G.K. Chesterton
The Blunders of Our Parties
A perfection of means, and confusion of aims, seems to be our main problem.
Albert Einstein