Clarence Darrow quotes:

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  • The best that we can do is to be kindly and helpful toward our friends and fellow passengers who are clinging to the same speck of dirt while we are drifting side by side to our common doom.

  • I do not believe in god because I do not believe in Mother Goose.

  • In spite of all the yearnings of men, no one can produce a single fact or reason to support the belief in God and in personal immortality.

  • I do not consider it an insult, but rather a compliment to be called an agnostic. I do not pretend to know where many ignorant men are sure - that is all that agnosticism means.

  • The origin of the absurd idea of immortal life is easy to discover; it is kept alive by hope and fear, by childish faith, and by cowardice.

  • Whenever I hear people discussing birth control, I always remember that I was fifth.

  • I don't believe in God because I don't believe in Mother Goose.

  • Working people have alot of bad habits, but the worst of these is work.

  • Chase after the truth like all hell and you'll free yourself, even though you never touch its coat tails.

  • You can only protect your liberties in this world by protecting the other man's freedom.

  • True patriotism hates injustice in its own land more than anywhere else.

  • The first half of our lives are ruined by our parents and the second half by our children.

  • I have suffered from being misunderstood, but I would have suffered a hell of a lot more if I had been understood.

  • With all their faults, trade unions have done more for humanity than any other organization of men that ever existed. They have done more for decency, for honesty, for education, for the betterment of the race, for the developing of character in men, than any other association of men.

  • Someday I hope to write a book where the royalties will pay for the copies I give away.

  • Do you, good people, believe that Adam and Eve were created in the Garden of Eden and that they were forbidden to eat from the tree of knowledge? I do. The church has always been afraid of that tree. It still is afraid of knowledge. Some of you say religion makes people happy. So does laughing gas. So does whiskey. I believe in the brain of man.

  • Different strokes for different folks.

  • I am a friend of the working man, and I would rather be his friend, than be one.

  • Just think of the tragedy of teaching children not to doubt.

  • The law does not pretend to punish everything that is dishonest. That would seriously interfere with business.

  • Probably the undertaker thinks less of death than almost any other man. He is so accustomed to it that his mind must involuntarily turn from its horror to a contemplation of how much he makes out of the burial.

  • The pursuit of truth will set you free; even if you never catch up with it.

  • I am an agnostic; I do not pretend to know what many ignorant men are sure of.

  • My constitution was destroyed long ago; now I am living under the bylaws.

  • Justice has nothing to do with what goes on in a courtroom; Justice is what comes out of a courtroom

  • Chloroform unfit children. Show them the same mercy that is shown beasts that are no longer fit to live.

  • There is no such thing as justice - in or out of court.

  • Some false representations contravene the law; some do not. ... The sensibilities of no two men are the same. Some would refuse to sell property without carefully explaining all about its merits and defects, and putting themselves in the purchasers' place and inquiring if he himself would buy under the circumstances. But such men never would be prosperous merchants.

  • The audience that storms the box-office of the theater to gain entrance to a sensational show is small and sleepy compared with the throng that crashes the courthouse door when something concerning real life and death is to be laid bare to the public.

  • Physical deformity, calls forth our charity. But the infinite misfortune of moral deformity calls forth nothing but hatred and vengeance.

  • Some of you say religion makes people happy. So does laughing gas.

  • No man is a good citizen, a good neighbor, a good friend, or a good man just because he obeys the law. The intrinsic worth is determined mainly by the intrinsic make-up.

  • Thirteen states with a population less than that of New York State alone can prevent repeal [of prohibition] until Halley's comet returns. One might as well talk about a summer vacation on Mars.

  • Liberty is the most jealous and exacting mistress that can beguile the brain and soul of man. From him who will not give her all, she will have nothing. She knows that his pretended love serves but to betray. But when once the fierce heat of her quenchless, lustrous eyes have burned into the victim's heart, he will know no other smile but hers.

  • History repeats itself. That's one of the things wrong with history.

  • The objector and the rebel who raises his voice against what he believes to be the injustice of the present and the wrongs of the past is the one who hunches the world along.

  • To think is to differ.

  • To be an effective criminal defense counsel, an attorney must be prepared to be demanding, outrageous, irreverent, blasphemous, a rogue, a renegade, and a hated, isolated, and lonely person - few love a spokesman for the despised and the damned.

  • Never forget, almost every case has been won or lost when the jury is sworn.

  • Lost causes are the only ones worth fighting for.

  • I cannot tell and I shall never know how many words of mine might have given birth to cruelty in place of love and kindness and charity.

  • The difference between the child and the man lies chiefly in the unlimited confidence and buoyancy of youth.

  • The world is made up for the most part of morons and natural tyrants, sure of themselves, strong in their own opinions, never doubting anything.

  • I had a vivid imagination. Not only could I put myself in the other person's place, but I could not avoid doing so. My sympathies always went out to the weak, the suffering, and the poor. Realizing their sorrows I tried to relieve them in order that I myself might be relieved.

  • No other offense has ever been visited with such severe penalties as seeking to help the oppressed.

  • Each child should be more intelligent than his parents.

  • Every government on earth is the personification of violence and force, and yet the doctine of non-resistance is as old as human thought - even more than this, the instinct is as old as life upon the earth.

  • I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure.

  • Calvin Coolidge was the greatest man who ever came out of Plymouth Corner, Vermont.

  • The purpose of life is to live it.

  • I am always suspicious of righteous indignation. Nothing is more cruel than righteous indignation.

  • This is life and all there is of life; to play the game, to play the cards we get; play them uncomplainingly and play them to the end. the playing of the game is the foregetting of self and play it bravely to the end

  • I am an Agnostic because I am not afraid to think. I am not afraid of any god in the universe who would send me or any other man or woman to hell. If there were such a being, he would not be a god; he would be a devil.

  • There are a lot of myths which make the human race cruel and barbarous and unkind. Good and Evil, Sin and Crime, Free Will and the like delusions made to excuse God for damning men and to excuse men for crucifying each other.

  • One of the bravest, grandest champions of human liberty the world has ever seen.{Darrow on the great Robert Ingersoll}

  • I have always felt that doubt was the beginning of wisdom, and the fear of God was the end of wisdom.

  • The fear of God is not the beginning of wisdom. The fear of God is the death of wisdom. Skepticism and doubt lead to study and investigation, and investigation is the beginning of wisdom.

  • I don't like spinach, and I'm glad I don't, because if I liked it I'd eat it, and I just hate it.

  • As long as the world shall last there will be wrongs, and if no man objected and no man rebelled, those wrongs would last forever.

  • The only real lawyers are trial lawyers, and trial lawyers try cases to juries.

  • A jury is more apt to be unbiased and independent than a court, but they very seldom stand up against strong public clamor. Judges naturally believe the defendant is guilty.

  • With all their faults, trade-unions have done more for humanity than any other organization of men that ever existed.

  • I do not pretend to know where many ignorant men are sure - that is all that agnosticism means.

  • I never wanted to see anybody die, but there are a few obituary notices I have read with pleasure.

  • Justice has nothing to do with what goes on in a courtroom; Justice is what comes out of a courtroom.

  • Depressions may bring people closer to the church but so do funerals.

  • History repeats itself, and that's one of the things that's wrong with history.

  • Even if you do learn to speak correct English, whom are you going to speak it to?

  • Laws should be like clothes. They should be made to fit the people they serve.

  • You can only be free if I am free.

  • When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President. I'm beginning to believe it.

  • I am pleading for the future; I am pleading for a time when hatred and cruelty will not control the hearts of men. When we can learn by, reason and judgment and understanding and faith that all life is worth saving, and that mercy is the highest attribute of man.

  • The efforts of the medical profession in the US to control:...its...job it proposes to monopolize. It has been carrying on a vigorous campaign all over the country against new methods and schools of healing because it wants the business...I have watched this medical profession for a long time and it bears watching.

  • It is indeed strange that with all the knowledge we have gained in the past hundred years we preserve and practice the methods of an ancient and barbarous world in our dealing with crime. So long as this is observed and exercised there can be no change except to heap more cruelties and more wretchedness upon those who are the victims of our foolish system.

  • It must always be remembered that all laws are naturally and inevitably evolved by the strongest force in a community, and in the last analysis made for the protection of the dominant class.

  • A criminal is someone without the capital to incorporate

  • I am not afraid of any god in the universe who would send me or any other man or woman to hell. If there were such a being, he would not be a god; he would be a devil.

  • The most human thing we can do is comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable.

  • An idea is a greater monument than a cathedral.

  • We are born and we die; and between these two most important events in our lives more or less time elapses which we have to waste somehow or other. In the end it does not seem to matter much whether we have done so in making money, or practicing law, or reading or playing, or in any other way, as long as we felt we were deriving a maximum of happiness out of our doings.

  • Inside every lawyer is the wreck of a poet.

  • The man who fights for his fellow-man is a better man than the one who fights for himself.

  • I have lived my life, and I have fought my battles, not against the weak and the poor - anybody can do that - but against power, against injustice, against oppression, and I have asked no odds from them, and I never shall.

  • You can't get to a pleasant place to be at unless you use pleasant methods to get there. When you are dealing with a human society the means is fully as important as the end.

  • The purpose of life is living. Men and women should get the most they can out of their lives.

  • When we fully understand the brevity of life, its fleeting joys and unavoidable pains; when we accept the facts that all men and women are approaching an inevitable doom: the consciousness of it should make us more kindly and considerate of each other. This feeling should make men and women use their best efforts to help their fellow travelers on the road, to make the path brighter and easier as we journey on. It should bring a closer kinship, a better understanding, and a deeper sympathy for the wayfarers who must live a common life and die a common death.

  • I am sure of very little, and I shouldn't be surprised if those things were wrong.

  • In this dilemma they evolved the theory of natural rights. If 'natural rights' means anything it means that the individual rights are to be determined by the conduct of Nature. But Nature knows nothing about rights in the sense of human conception.

  • Instead of yielding to idle conversation it might profit one to cultivate silence and contemplation.

  • To say that the universe was here last year, or millions of years ago, does not explain its origin. This is still a mystery. As to the question of the origin of things, man can only wonder and doubt and guess.

  • If you lose the power to laugh, you lose the power to think.

  • The trouble with law is lawyers.

  • Eugene V. Debs has always been one of my heroes.

  • If a man is happy in America, it is considered he is doing something wrong.

  • Laws should be like clothes. They should be made to fit the people they are meant to serve.

  • Can any rational person believe that the Bible is anything but a human document?

  • Religion is the belief in future life and in God. I don't believe in either.

  • Every one knows that the heavenly bodies move in certain paths in relation to each other with seeming consistency and regularity which we call [physical] law. ... No one attributes freewill or motive to the material world. Is the conduct of man or the other animals any more subject to whim or choice than the action of the planets? ... We know that man's every act is induced by motives that led or urged him here or there; that the sequence of cause and effect runs through the whole universe, and is nowhere more compelling than with man.

  • Ancestors do not mean so much. The rebel who succeeds generally makes it easier for the posterity that follows him; so these descendants are usually contented and smug and soft. Rebels are made from life, not ancestors.

  • There is a soul of truth in error; there is a soul of good in evil.

  • Nothing is so loved by tyrants as obedient subjects.

  • All men have an emotion to kill; when they strongly dislike someone they involuntarily wish he was dead. I have never killed anyone, but I have read some obituary notices with great satisfaction.

  • None meet life honestly and few heroically.

  • Do I need to argue to Your Honor that cruelty only breeds cruelty? That hatred only causes hatred; that if there is any way to soften this human heart which is hard enough at its best, if there is any way to kill evil and hatred and all that goes with it, it is not through evil and hatred and cruelty; it is through charity, and love, and understanding?

  • We're all killers at heart . . . . I have never taken anybody's life, but I have often read obituary notices with considerable satisfaction.

  • Punishment as punishment is not admissible unless the offender has had the free will to select his course.

  • I had grown tired of standing in the lean and lonely front line facing the greatest enemy that ever confronted man -- public opinion.

  • The ablest lawyers are always associated with the biggest fees.

  • I feel as I always have, that the earth is the home and the only home of man, and I am convinced that whatever he is to get out of his existence he must get while he is here.

  • If there is a soul, what is it, and where did it come from, and where does it go? Can anyone who is guided by his reason possibly imagine a soul independent of a body, or the place of its residence, or the character of it, or anything concerning it? If man is justified in any belief or disbelief on any subject, he is warranted in the disbelief in a soul. Not one scrap of evidence exists to prove any such impossible thing.

  • Lawyers are natural politicians.

  • Many writers claim that nearly all crime is caused by economic conditions, or in other words that poverty is practically the whole cause of crime. Endless statistics have been gathered on this subject which seem to show conclusively that property crimes are largely the result of the unequal distribution of wealth. But crime of any class cannot be safely ascribed to a single cause. Life is too complex, heredity is too variant and imperfect, too many separate things contribute to human behavior, to make it possible to trace all actions to a single cause.

  • An agnostic is a doubter. The word is generally applied to those who doubt the verity of accepted religious creeds of faiths.

  • Most jury trials are contests between the rich and poor.

  • When every event was a miracle, when there was no order or system or law, there was no occasion for studying any subject, or being interested in anything excepting a religion which took care of the soul. As man doubted the primitive conceptions about religion, and no longer accepted the literal, miraculous teachings of ancient books, he set himself to understand nature.

  • A prison is confining to the body, but whether it affects the mind, depends entirely upon the mind.

  • Laws have come down to us from old customs and folk-ways based on primitive ideas of man's origin, capacity and responsibility.

  • Justice must take account of infinite circumstances which a human being cannot understand.

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