"some people seem to think it an expression of humility to call "the fertile earth a dunghill, and all the blessings of life by the thankless name of vanities." Instead, in Paine's opinion, it looks more like ingratitude."
…Paine's preferred principles were humanist ones: be grateful for life, do not make a cult of suffering, be tolerant toward others, and try to deal with problems as rationally as possible. He summed up his Enlightenment humanist credo: I believe in the equality of man, and I believe that religious duties consist in doing justice, loving mercy, and endeavouring to make our fellow-creatures happy. The Age of Reason, with its message of fellow feeling, equality, happiness, and the enlightened celebration of a magnificent cosmos, brought Paine some far-from-happy experiences. —Bakewell, Humanly PossibleAnton Chekhov said, "Any idiot can face a crisis; it is this day-to-day living that wears you out."
His views on religion and morality were also those of a humanist: he disliked dogma and was skeptical about supernatural beliefs. As one twentieth-century admirer of Chekhov wrote: He said—and no one had said this before, not even Tolstoy—that first and foremost we are all of us human beings. Do you understand? Human beings! He said something no one in Russia had ever said. He said that first of all we are human beings—and only secondly are we bishops, Russians, shopkeepers, Tartars, workers. . . . Chekhov said: let's put God—and all these grand progressive ideas—to one side. Let's begin with man; let's be kind and attentive to the individual man. —Bakewell
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