QuoteProject
The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also.
Mark Twain
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

This quote suggests that one's certainty in judging others' beliefs reflects a doubt in one's own beliefs.

Mark Twain expresses a thought-provoking idea about the nature of belief and certainty. He implies that the ease with which one critiques or dismisses another's religion could stem from blind confidence, which in turn raises questions about the validity of one's own beliefs. This self-awareness encourages a more humble approach to understanding faith and values.

Themes

BeliefDoubtPhilosophyReligionSelf-AwarenessConfidence

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be shared during a philosophical discussion on faith.

More from Mark Twain

Weather is a literary specialty, and no untrained hand can turn out a good article on it
Mark TwainRead
The easy part of being an artist is figuring out the message that everyone else is ready to hear. The hard part is waiting for the proper lull to make the announcement.
Mark TwainRead
You can't reason with your heart; it has its own laws, and thumps about things which the intellect scorns.
Mark TwainRead
To be good is noble; but to show others how to be good is nobler and no trouble.
Mark TwainRead
Name the greatest of all inventors. Accident.
Mark TwainRead
In Paris they just simply opened their eyes and stared when we spoke to them in French! We never did succeed in making those idiots understand their own language.
Mark TwainRead

Similar quotes

Most go to prison not on account of their irreducible uniqueness as people but because they are part of a marginalized sector of the population who never had a chance, who were slated for it early on.
Rachel KushnerRead
The good four. Honest with ourselves and with whatever is friend to us; courageous toward the enemy; generous toward the vanquished; polite-always that is how the four cardinal virtues want us.
Friedrich NietzscheRead
It is the flash which appears, the thunderbolt will follow.
VoltaireRead
I have always been of the mind that in a democracy manners are the only effective weapons against the bowie-knife.
James Russell LowellRead
The optimist thinks this is the best of all possible worlds. The pessimist fears it is true.
J. Robert OppenheimerRead
As to Jesus of Nazareth, my opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think the system of Morals and his Religion, as he left them to us, the best the World ever saw or is likely to see; but I apprehend it has received various corrupting Changes; and I have, with most of the present Dissenters in England, some doubts as to his divinity.
Benjamin FranklinRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.