My Creed

by Robert Green Ingersoll (1833 – 1899)

I do not pretend to know what is beyond the stars, or in the middle of the sun, or just behind the moon. I simply state that I do not know.

We are all travelling to the depot. We may be riding on different cars, but we are all going to the same destination. Wise people will be kind to each other.

Happiness is the only good. The time to be happy is now. The place to be happy is here. The way to be happy is to make others so.

The only way to be happy is to be honest—to be useful—to do good—to have the world a little better for you having lived.

My doctrine is that the universe is governed by law—everything is the result of cause and effect—that human action is the result of human condition.

We should destroy the unjust, and give liberty to the oppressed. We should remember that hatred is a poison that hurts the hater more than the hated.

The world is my country, to do good is my religion.

I belong to the great church that holds the world within its starlit walls, that has for its altar the grassy earth, and for its dome the star-jeweled sky, and for its creed the Golden Rule.

This essay was first published in 1897 and outlines Ingersoll's humanistic philosophy, prioritizing kindness, reason, and tangible good over dogma.