aizaz

“Victorious warriors win first and then go to war, while defeated warriors go to war first and then seek to win”
― Sun Tzu, The Art of War

“Revelation when applied to religion, means something communicated
immediately from God to man. It is revelation to the first person
only, and hearsay to every other, and, consequently, they are not obliged
to believe it. It is a contradiction in terms and ideas to call anything a revelation
that comes to us at second hand, either verbally or in writing. Revelation
is necessarily limited to the first communication.”
― Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason

“He prays dictatorially. When it is sunshine,
he prays for rain, and when it is rain, he prays for sunshine. He
follows the same idea in everything that he prays for; for what is the
amount of all his prayers, but an attempt to make the Almighty change
his mind, and act otherwise than he does? It is as if he were to say—-
thou knowest not so well as I.”
― Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason

“Those three means are Mystery, Miracle, and Prophecy. The first two are incompatible with true religion, and the third ought always to be suspected.

As mystery answered all general purposes, miracle followed as an occasional auxiliary. The former served to bewilder the mind, the latter to puzzle the senses. The one was the lingo, the other the legerdemain.

As Mystery and Miracle took charge of the past and the present, Prophecy took charge of the future, and rounded the tenses of faith.”
― Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason