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Nearly all people stand in great horror of annihilation, and yet to give up your individuality is to annihilate yourself. Mental slavery is mental death, and every man who has given up his intellectual freedom is the living coffin of his dead soul.

Nearly all people stand in great horror of annihilation, and yet to give up your individuality is to annihilate yourself. Mental slavery is mental death, and every man who has given up his intellectual freedom is the living coffin of his dead soul.

Approximate author period: c. 1866 AD · industrial

Meaning not yet available

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Attribution & collection notes
Author or tradition
Robert G. Ingersoll
Attribution: attributed
Country attributed
Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin.
Historical period
Approximate author period: c. 1866 AD · industrial
Approximate author-period anchor from life dates 1833 to 1899; Wikidata Q469882, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q469882 (accessed 2026-10-08). Not a quotation composition date.
An author lifetime, approximate period or collection date is not necessarily the date when these words were first written or spoken.
Recorded source
Contributor-provided quotation collection

Supplied reference C; CSV row 80337; supplied attribution, independently unverified

A collection's publication date can be later than the words it records.