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The secular state is the guarantee of religious pluralism. This apparent paradox, again, is the simplest and most elegant of political truths.

Christopher Hitchens

I learned that very often the most intolerant and narrow-minded people are the ones who congratulate themselves on their tolerance and open-mindedness.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Congratulation Learning Mindset Myself Open Tolerance
Thanks to the telescope and the microscope, religion no longer offers an explanation for anything important.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Important Microscope Offering Thankful
I learned that to be amusing was not to be frivolous and that language – always the language – was the magic key as much to prose as to poetry.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Key Language Learning Magic Myself Poetry
If religious instruction were not allowed until the child had attained the age of reason, we would be living in a quite different world.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Allow Children Different Quite Reason Religious World
The search for Nirvana, like the search for Utopia or the end of history or the classless society, is ultimately a futile and dangerous one. It involves, if it does not necessitate, the sleep of reason. There is no escape from anxiety and struggle.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Anxiety Dangerous End Escape History Search Society
In the ordinary moral universe, the good will do the best they can, the worst will do the worst they can, but if you want to make good people do wicked things, you’ll need religion.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Goodness Moral Ordinary Religion Universe Yourself
There’s been some research in cognitive science, I’m told, that discloses that there have always been perhaps 10 to 15 percent of people who are, as Pascal puts it, so made that they cannot believe. To us, when people talk about faith, it’s white noise.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Faith Noise People Research Science White
We have lived in a world where the discoveries of physics and genetics are far more awe-inspiring, as well as infinitely more liberating, than the claims of any religion.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Discover Inspirational Live Religion World
My own opinion is enough for me. And I claim the right to defend it against any consensus, any majority anywhere, any place, any time. And anyone who disagrees with this can pick a number, get in line and kiss my ass.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Attitude Enough Myself Opinion Place Time Validation
To ‘choose’ dogma and faith over doubt and experience is to throw out the ripening vintage and to reach greedily for the Kool-Aid.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Experience Faith Reach Yourself
I don’t think it’s possible to have a sense of tragedy without having a sense of humor.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Humor Possible Thinking Tragedy
Your favorite virtue? An appreciation for irony.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Appreciation Favorite Irony Virtue
We live only a few conscious decades, and we fret ourselves enough for several lifetimes.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Enough Life Live Time
Jesus makes large claims for his heavenly father but never mentions that his mother is or was a virgin, and is repeatedly very rude and coarse to her when she makes an appearance.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Appearance Father Heaven Herself Repeat
Everything about Christianity is contained in the pathetic image of ‘the flock.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Image Pathetic Religion
The discovery there is no god is a great relief, because if there were, it would be like living in a celestial North Korea if there was one. You would never be able to escape.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Discover Escape God Greatness Oneself

The secular state is the guarantee of religious pluralism. This apparent paradox, again, is the simplest and most elegant of political truths.

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The secular state is the guarantee of religious pluralism. This apparent paradox, again, is the simplest and most elegant of political truths.

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Popular Authors

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