WIST Quotations

Hugo, Victor -- Toilers of the Sea [Les Travailleurs de la Mer], Book 1, ch. 4 (1866) [tr. Thomas (1911)]

Dave — Mon, 22 Dec 2025 17:33:54 +0000

But it is just those books which a man possesses, but does not read, which constitute the most suspicious evidence against him. The Spanish Inquisition have deliberated on that point, and have come to a conclusion that places the matter beyond further doubt.

[Mais ce sont précisément les livres qu’un homme ne lit pas qui l’accusent les plus. L’inquisition d’Espagne a jugé ce point, et l’a mis hors de doute.]

Victor Hugo (1802-1885) French writer
Toilers of the Sea [Les Travailleurs de la Mer], Book 1, ch. 4 (1866) [tr. Thomas (1911)]
(Source)

On an inherited book in Latin on the protagonist's bookshelf which, his not knowing Latin, makes folk suspicious. (The book is a 17th Century treatise on rhubarb.)

(Source (French)). Other translations:

But it is exactly for those very books that a man does not peruse that he is condemned. The history of the Inquisition has proved this to us.
[tr. Campbell (1887)]

But it is just those books which a man does not read which condemn him the most. The Spanish Inquisition passed judgment on this point and placed it beyond a doubt.
[tr. Hapgood (1888)]

But it is just those books that a man does not read that provide evidence against him. The Spanish Inquisition considered this point and put the matter beyond doubt.
[tr. Hogarth (2002)]

Orwell, George -- Essay (1947-03), “Lear, Tolstoy and the Fool,” Polemic Magazine, No. 7

Dave — Fri, 22 Aug 2025 15:50:31 +0000

There are people who are convinced of the wickedness both of armies and of police forces, but who are nevertheless much more intolerant and inquisitorial in outlook than the normal person who believes that it is necessary to use violence in certain circumstances. They will not say to somebody else, “Do this, that and the other or you will go to prison”, but they will, if they can, get inside his brain and dictate his thoughts for him in the minutest particulars.

George Orwell (1903-1950) English journalist, essayist, writer [pseud. of Eric Arthur Blair]
Essay (1947-03), “Lear, Tolstoy and the Fool,” Polemic Magazine, No. 7
(Source)

Collected in Inside the Whale, and Other Essays (1962).

Bierce, Ambrose -- “Rack,” The Devil’s Dictionary (1911)

Dave — Tue, 03 Jun 2025 15:51:49 +0000

RACK, n. An argumentative implement formerly much used in persuading devotees of a false faith to embrace the living truth. As a call to the unconverted the rack never had any particular efficacy, and is now held in light popular esteem.

Ambrose Bierce (1842-1914?) American writer and journalist
“Rack,” The Devil’s Dictionary (1911)
(Source)

Originally published in the "Cynic's Word Book" column in the New York American (1906-06-29).

Stevenson, Adlai -- Speech (1952-10-08), “The Area of Freedom,” University of Wisconsin, Madison

Dave — Fri, 23 Aug 2024 14:26:35 +0000

Disturbing things have taken place in our own land. The pillorying of the innocent has caused the wise to stammer and the timid to retreat. I would shudder for this country if I thought that we too must surrender to the sinister figure of the Inquisition, of the great accuser. I hope that the time will never come in America when charges are taken as the equivalent of facts, when suspicions are confused with certainties, and when the voice of the accuser stills every other voice in the land.

Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965) American diplomat, statesman
Speech (1952-10-08), “The Area of Freedom,” University of Wisconsin, Madison
(Source)

Addison, Joseph -- Essay (1711-10-02), The Spectator, No. 185

Dave — Wed, 15 Jun 2022 14:54:28 +0000

I love to see a Man zealous in a good Matter, and especially when his Zeal shews it self for advancing Morality, and promoting the Happiness of Mankind: But when I find the Instruments he works with are Racks and Gibbets, Gallies and Dungeons; when he imprisons Mens Persons, confiscates their Estates, ruins their Families, and burns the Body to save the Soul, I cannot stick to pronounce of such a one, that (whatever he may think of his Faith and Religion) his Faith is vain, and his Religion unprofitable.

Joseph Addison (1672-1719) English essayist, poet, statesman
Essay (1711-10-02), The Spectator, No. 185
(Source)

Angelou, Maya -- “Facing Evil,” Interview by Bill Moyers (1982)

Dave — Fri, 30 Apr 2021 19:57:53 +0000

Throughout our nervous history, we have constructed pyramidic towers of evil, ofttimes in the name of good. Our greed, fear and lasciviousness have enabled us to murder our poets, who are ourselves, to castigate our priests, who are ourselves. The lists of our subversions of the good stretch from before recorded history to this moment. We drop our eyes at the mention of the bloody, torturous Inquisition. Our shoulders sag at the thoughts of African slaves lying spoon-fashion in the filthy hatches of slave-ships, and the subsequent auction blocks upon which were built great fortunes in our country. We turn our heads in bitter shame at the remembrance of Dachau and the other gas ovens, where millions of ourselves were murdered by millions of ourselves. As soon as we are reminded of our actions, more often than not we spend incredible energy trying to forget what we’ve just been reminded of.

Maya Angelou (1928-2014) American poet, memoirist, activist [b. Marguerite Ann Johnson]
“Facing Evil,” Interview by Bill Moyers (1982)
(Source)

Lindsey, Ben -- The Revolt of Modern Youth (1925)

Dave — Mon, 24 Feb 2014 13:15:33 +0000

The churches used to win their arguments against atheism, agnosticism, and other burning issues by burning the ism-ists, which is fine proof that there is a devil but hardly evidence that there is a God.

Ben Lindsey (1869-1943) American jurist and social reformer [Benjamin Barr Lindsey]
The Revolt of Modern Youth (1925)

Jefferson, Thomas -- Letter (1809-09-27) to James Fishback [draft]

Dave — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 14:07:29 +0000

Every religion consists of moral precepts, & of dogmas. In the first they all agree. All forbid us to murder, steal, plunder, bear false witness Etc. and these are the articles necessary for the preservation of order, justice, & happiness in society. In their particular dogmas all differ; no two professing the same. These respect vestments, ceremonies, physical opinions, & metaphysical speculations, totally unconnected with morality, & unimportant to the legitimate objects of society. Yet these are the questions on which have hung the bitter schisms of Nazarenes, Socinians, Arians, Athanasians in former times, & now of Trinitarians, Unitarians, Catholics, Lutherans, Calvinists, Methodists, Baptists, Quakers Etc. Among the Mahometans we are told that thousands fell victims to the dispute whether the first or second toe of Mahomet was longest; & what blood, how many human lives have the words ‘this do in remembrance of me’ cost the Christian world!

We all agree in the obligation of the moral precepts of Jesus: but we schismatize & lose ourselves in subtleties about his nature, his conception maculate or immaculate, whether he was a god or not a god, whether his votaries are to be initiated by simple aspersion, by immersion, or without water; whether his priests must be robed in white, in black, or not robed at all; whether we are to use our own reason, or the reason of others, in the opinions we form, or as to the evidence we are to believe. It is on questions of this, & still less importance, that such oceans of human blood have been spilt, & whole regions of the earth have been desolated by wars & persecutions, in which human ingenuity has been exhausted in inventing new tortures for their brethren.

It is time then to become sensible how insoluble these questions are by minds like ours, how unimportant, & how mischievous; & to consign them to the sleep of death, never to be awakened from it. The varieties in the structure & action of the human mind, as in those of the body, are the work of our creator, against which it cannot be a religious duty to erect the standard of uniformity.

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter (1809-09-27) to James Fishback [draft]
(Source)

Jefferson seriously dialed back his actual response, though he kept both in his files; the final letter read, in this passage:

The interests of society require the observation of those moral precepts only in which all religions agree, (for all forbid us to murder, steal, plunder, or bear false witness.) and that we should not intermeddle with the particular dogmas in which all religions differ, and which are totally unconnected with morality. in all of them we see good men, & as many in one as another. The varieties in the structure & action of the human mind as in those of the body, are the work of our creator, against which it cannot be a religious duty to erect the standard of uniformity.

Jefferson, Thomas -- Notes on the State of Virginia, Query 17 (1782)

Dave — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 16:21:14 +0000

Subject opinion to coercion: whom will you make your inquisitors? Fallible men; men governed by bad passions, by private as well as public reasons.

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Notes on the State of Virginia, Query 17 (1782)
(Source)

Jefferson, Thomas -- Letter (1803-04-21) to Benjamin Rush

Dave — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 18:47:01 +0000

It behooves every man, who values liberty of conscience for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others; or their case may, by change of circumstances, become his own. It behooves him, too, in his own case, to give no example of concession, betraying the common right of independent opinion, by answering questions of faith, which the laws have left between God and himself.

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) American political philosopher, polymath, statesman, US President (1801-09)
Letter (1803-04-21) to Benjamin Rush
(Source)

Stevenson, Adlai -- Message (1951-06-26), Veto of Illinois State Senate Bill 102

Dave — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 13:13:53 +0000

The whole notion of loyalty inquisitions is a natural characteristic of the police state, not of democracy. Knowing his rule rests upon compulsion rather than consent, the dictator must always assume the disloyalty, not for a few but of many, and guard against it by continual inquisition and liquidation of the unreliable. The history of Soviet Russia is a modern example of this ancient practice.
The democratic state, on the other hand, is based on the consent of its members. The vast majority of our people are intensely loyal, as they have amply demonstrated. To question, even by implication, the loyalty and devotion of a large group of citizens is to create an atmosphere of suspicion and distrust which is neither justified, healthy, nor consistent with our traditions. […] I must, in good conscience, protest against any unnecessary suppression of our ancient rights of free men. Moreover, we will win the contest of ideas that afflicts the world not by suppressing those rights, but by their triumph. We must not burn down the house to kill the rats.

Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965) American diplomat, statesman
Message (1951-06-26), Veto of Illinois State Senate Bill 102
(Source)

The Broyles Bill would have required all public workers, teachers, and officials, as well as candidates for office to sign loyalty oaths. Its veto by Stevenson, as Illinois Governor, was widely used by his political enemies during the Red Scare of the era.

This quote is widely misidentified as a more generic comment condemning the federal McCarran Internal Security Act of 1950. I've been unable to find any primary source connecting this quotation to that event.

This passage is often elided and paraphrased down, e.g.:

The whole notion of loyalty inquisitions is a national characteristic of the police state, not of democracy. I must, in good conscience, protest against any unnecessary suppression of our rights as free men. We must not burn down the house to kill the rats.

Ingersoll, Robert Green -- Interview, The Sunday Union, New Haven, Conn. (10 Apr 1881)

Dave — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 09:40:40 +0000

If a man really believes that God once upheld slavery; that he commanded soldiers to kill women and babes; that he believed in polygamy; that he persecuted for opinion’s sake; that he will punish forever, and that he hates an unbeliever, the effect in my judgment will be bad. It always has been bad. This belief built the dungeons of the Inquisition. This belief made the Puritan murder the Quaker.

Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899) American lawyer, freethinker, orator
Interview, The Sunday Union, New Haven, Conn. (10 Apr 1881)
(Source)

Ingersoll, Robert Green -- “The Liberty of Man, Woman, and Child” (1877)

Dave — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 10:38:00 +0000

You cannot change the conclusion of the brain by torture; nor by social ostracism. But I will tell you what you can do by these, and what you have done. You can make hypocrites by the million. You can make a man say that he has changed his mind; but he remains of the same opinion still. Put fetters all over him; crush his feet in iron boots; stretch him to the last gasp upon the holy rack; burn him, if you please, but his ashes will be of the same opinion still.

Robert Green Ingersoll (1833-1899) American lawyer, freethinker, orator
“The Liberty of Man, Woman, and Child” (1877)
(Source)

Griswold, Whitney -- “A Little Learning,” speech, Phillips Academy, Andover (1952, Spring)

Dave — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 10:09:31 +0000

Books won’t stay banned. They won’t burn. Ideas won’t go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas.

Whitney Griswold (1906–1963) American historian, educator [Alfred Whitney Griswold]
“A Little Learning,” speech, Phillips Academy, Andover (1952, Spring)
(Source)

Reprinted in The Atlantic Monthly (1952-11) and Griswold's Essays in Education (1954).

Russell, Bertrand -- “Free Thought and Official Propaganda,” lecture, South Place Institute, London (1922-03-24)

Dave — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 17:35:17 +0000

It is clear that the most elementary condition, if thought is to be free, is the absence of legal penalties for the expression of opinions. No great country has yet reached to this level, although most of them think they have. The opinions which are still persecuted strike the majority as so monstrous and immoral that the general principle of toleration can not be held to apply to them. But this is exactly the same view as that which made possible the tortures of the Inquisition. There was a time when Protestantism seemed as wicked as Bolshevism seems now.

Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) English mathematician and philosopher
“Free Thought and Official Propaganda,” lecture, South Place Institute, London (1922-03-24)
(Source)