Idolatry- christiansquoting.org.uk

A faith much more deeply ingrained in this country than Christianity. Since [World War II], and to a much greater extent than in America, an astonishingly powerful superstition has arisen that only the State is truly competent to preserve the fabric of society and to address its most pressing needs.
Matthew d'Ancona ' Sunday Telegraph, June 2000

The British like their charities and churches well enough, but they have lost the sense that such bodies can be a principal source of social cohesion and welfare. Instead, the British worship their socialized medicine plan, the National Health Service, which is held up as "the closest thing the English have to a religion." For all the rhetoric of a 'new civic politics'... we still turn instinctively to the State for solutions. When politicians refer to 'compassion,' the public still thinks they mean 'public spending.'--Matthew d'Ancona ' Sunday Telegraph, June 2000

Man's mind is like a store of idolatry and superstition; so much so that if a man believes his own mind it is certain that he will forsake Godand forge some idol in his own brain. JOHN CALVIN

The sky cannot have two suns.- Chiang Kai-Shek (1886-1975) In "Mao," by Ross Merrill, ch. 10, 1993.

Idolatry is committed, not merely by setting up false gods, but also by setting up false devils; by making men afraid of war or alcohol, or economic law, when they should be afraid of spiritual corruption and cowardice." - G K Chesterton ILN 9/11/09

They who worship gold in a world so corrupt as this, have at least one thing to plead in defence of their idolatry--the power of their idol. This idol can boast of two peculiarities; it is worshipped in all climates, without a single temple, and by all classes, without a single hypocrite. --Caleb Colton

We boast our emancipation from many superstitions; but if we have broken any idols, it is through a transfer of idolatry.--Ralph Waldo Emerson

So long as men worship the Caesars and Napoleons, Caesars and Napoleons will duly arise and make them miserable [Aldous Huxley 1894-1963]

Do not suppose that abuses are eliminated by destroying the object which is abused. Men can go wrong with wine and women. Shall we prohibit and abolish women? The sun, moon, and stars have been worshipped. Shall we pluck them out of the sky. Luther

Whatever your heart clings to and confides in, that is really your God. --Martin Luther (1483-1546) _Large Catechism_ [1529], "The First Commandment"

Man cannot make a worm, yet he will make gods by the dozen. -- Michel Eyquem de Montaigne

From Sinai we have heard thee speak,
And from mount Calv'ry too;
And yet to idols oft we seek,
While thou art in our view
Some golden calf, or golden dream,
Some fancied creature-good,
Presumes to share the heart with him,
Who bought the whole with blood.

LORD, save us from our golden calves,
Our sin with grief we own;
We would no more be thine by halves,
But live to thee alone.
John Newton. Olney Hymns 18, The golden calf.

And, by the way we may see hence the vanity as well as the idolatry of them who would represent Christ in glory as the object of our adoration in pictures and images. They fashion wood or stone into the likeness of a man. They adorn it with colours and flourishes of art, to set it forth unto the senses and fancies of superstitious persons as having a resemblance of glory. And when they have done, "they lavish gold out of the bag," as the prophet speaks, in various sorts of supposed ornaments, - such as are so only to the vainest sort of mankind, - and so propose it as an image or resemblance of Christ in glory.
But what is there in it that hath the least respect there unto, - the least likeness of it? Nay, is it not the most effectual means that can be devised to divert the minds of men from true and real apprehensions of it? Doth it teach anything of the subsistence of the human nature of Christ in the person of the Son of God? nay, doth it not obliterate all thoughts of it! What is represented thereby of the union of it unto God, and the immediate communications of God unto it? Doth it declare the manifestation of all the glorious properties of the divine nature in him?
One thing, indeed, they ascribe unto it that is proper unto Christ, - namely, that it is to be adored and worshipped; whereby they add idolatry unto their folly. Persons who know not what it is to live by faith - whose minds design in religion but to gratify their inward superstition by their outward senses - may be pleased for a time, and ruined for ever, by these delusions. Those who have real faith in Christ, and love unto him, have a more glorious object for their exercise.
John Owen, Works , (vol. 1 pg. 244)

There is nothing so abominable in the eyes of God and of men as idolatry, whereby men render to the creature that honor which is due only to the Creator. BLAISE PASCAL

And now I see the face of god, and I raise this god over the earth, this god whom men have sought since men came into being, this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride.This god, this one word: "I." --Ayn Rand, Anthem

Hero-worship is strongest where there is least regard for human freedom.-- Herbert Spencer

An idol of the mind is as offensive to God as an idol of the hand. A.W. TOZER

The essence of idolatry is the entertainment of thoughts about God that are not worthy of Him. A. W. TOZER

God made man of the dust of the earth and man makes a god of the dust of the earth. THOMAS WATSON