Wikiquote files this under Disputed. Its only citation there is John E. Remsburg’s Six Historic Americans (1906), which attributes it to a Jefferson letter addressed to a ‘Dr. Woods’ — a letter Remsburg does not reproduce, and which Wikiquote notes has never been reproduced since. Wikiquote also reports that the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, which maintains Monticello, lists the quotation as spurious.
“I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition one redeeming feature” Not Thomas Jefferson — no such letter has ever been produced. The only source Wikiquote cites is John E. Remsburg’s Six Historic Americans (1906), quoting a letter to a "Dr. Woods" that it does not reproduce; the Thomas Jefferson Foundation lists the quotation as spurious. Provenance traced at quotle.info Verbatim: “I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition one redeeming feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology.”
⚠ The slide-ready mistake: crediting this to Thomas Jefferson. Use the credit shown above instead.
Can you use it?
? We couldn’t verify where this wording comes from, so there’s no rights status to give. Safe to present as an unverified or anonymous line — just don’t assert a specific author or source.
Image direction — grounded in this quote’s real context; paste into your image tool
In context
Evoking the themes of truth and doubt. Theme: "I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition one redeeming feature". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.
Minimalist
Minimalist editorial slide for the quote "I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition one redeeming feature". Clean background, a single muted accent color, generous negative space, subtle paper or linen texture, no literal illustration — let the words carry it. Reserve clear space for a serif quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.
Provenance
What there is instead of a source
Claimed source
A letter from Jefferson to ‘Dr. Woods’
Status of that letter
Never reproduced; no manuscript cited
Where the claim comes from
John E. Remsburg, Six Historic Americans (1906), ch. 2, p. 74
Jefferson Foundation
Lists the quotation as spurious (per Wikiquote)
I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition one redeeming feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology.
This is the fuller form as Wikiquote prints it. The second sentence is usually dropped in circulation, which is why the version people search for stops at ‘one redeeming feature’.
Wikiquote’s Thomas Jefferson page ↗ places this line in its Disputed section — not in the sourced section — and gives its only citation as John E. Remsburg, Six Historic Americans (New York: The Truth Seeker Company, 1906), chapter 2, p. 74.
Wikiquote records two specific problems with that citation: Remsburg ‘claimed it to be from a letter to “Dr. Woods”’, and ‘the full letter is never reproduced’. An attributed letter that nobody has ever printed is the standard shape of a manufactured quotation.
The same Wikiquote entry reports that the Jefferson Foundation — the body that runs Monticello and maintains the standard reference list of spurious Jefferson quotations — lists this quotation as spurious. We were not able to read the Foundation’s page ourselves: monticello.org is unreachable from the environment this record was built in, so that finding is reported here at second hand, on Wikiquote’s authority, and not as something we confirmed at source.
We also could not read Remsburg’s 1906 text directly — archive.org, which hosts the scan Wikiquote links, was likewise unreachable, and Six Historic Americans is not on Wikisource or Project Gutenberg. The page and chapter given above are Wikiquote’s, not ours.
We are not asserting a rights status. Nobody has located an author or an original publication for this sentence, and a line whose origin is unknown is a line whose ownership is unknown. The 1906 book that carries Wikiquote’s only citation would itself be out of copyright in the United States, but that says nothing about where the words came from before Remsburg printed them.
Rights status is our research, not legal advice — and copyright varies by country and edition. For commercial or published use, confirm with the rightsholder. See terms.
Fact-check
Why this one does not stand up
Jefferson wrote a great deal about religion, and some of it is genuinely severe. That is precisely why a fabricated line in this register travels so easily — it sounds like him.
✕
The claimed letterA letter to ‘Dr. Woods’ never produced
Remsburg’s 1906 book is the only source Wikiquote cites, and it notes that Remsburg ‘claimed it to be from a letter to “Dr. Woods”’ while ‘the full letter is never reproduced’. No manuscript, no recipient identified beyond a surname, no printed text read the Disputed entry ↗.
✕
The Jefferson FoundationNot Thomas Jefferson Not Thomas Jefferson
Wikiquote reports that the Jefferson Foundation lists the quotation as spurious. That is the body that maintains the reference list of Jefferson quotations, so its ruling is the one that matters — though we flag that we relied on Wikiquote for it rather than reading the Foundation’s page where we read it ↗.
~
Who was actually writingJohn E. Remsburg (1848–1919) Popularizer, not author
Remsburg was an American freethought lecturer and writer, a president of the American Secular Union, and the author of polemics including The Christ (1909). A quotation that first surfaces inside a movement text arguing a case, with no document behind it, is evidence about the movement rather than about Jefferson his biography ↗.
~
Why it sounds rightJefferson really did write about ‘monkish ignorance and superstition’ genuine neighbour
In his last letter, to Roger C. Weightman on 24 June 1826, Jefferson hoped the Declaration would be ‘the signal of arousing men to burst the chains under which monkish ignorance and superstition had persuaded them to bind themselves’. That is sourced, dated and in Wikiquote’s sourced section — and it is aimed at clerical authority, not at Christianity itself the genuine line ↗.
✓Nobody can say who wrote it. What can be said is that the only source ever offered is a 1906 book quoting a letter it does not print, and that the Jefferson Foundation calls the quotation spurious Wikiquote’s Disputed section ↗.
Context
The real Jefferson is stranger than the fake
Jefferson’s actual writing on religion is not a blanket dismissal. He cut up copies of the Gospels to separate what he took to be the authentic moral teaching of Jesus from what he called the ‘fictions of his pseudo-followers’, and he defended that teaching as unsurpassed. He was scathing about priests and about doctrine; he was not scathing about Jesus.
The fabricated line collapses that distinction into a flat sneer, which is what makes it useful to whoever put it into circulation and useless as evidence about Jefferson.
He was scathing about priests and about doctrine. He was not scathing about Jesus.
Explore
Filed under
More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.
1743–1826 · Third US president & author of the Declaration of Independence
Thomas Jefferson drafted the Declaration of Independence, wrote the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, and served as the third president of the United States. He is one of the most heavily documented Americans of his century — his correspondence runs to tens of thousands of items — which is exactly what makes an unproduceable letter suspicious. He also wrote at length and sharply about organised religion, so a fabricated line in that register finds a ready audience. He died at Monticello on 4 July 1826.
For writers & researchers
Cite this
No source located
No manuscript or printed letter located. Wikiquote’s only citation is John E. Remsburg, Six Historic Americans (New York: The Truth Seeker Company, 1906), ch. 2, p. 74, which attributes it to an unreproduced letter to a ‘Dr. Woods’ — page reference per Wikiquote; the 1906 text was not readable from here.
This verification page
Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition one redeeming feature.’?” Last verified 29 Jul 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/i-have-recently-been-examining-all-the-known-superstitions/