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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

I’m an atheist. I’m not neutral about religion, I’m hostile to it. I think it is a positively bad idea, not just a false one. And I mean not just organized religion, but religious belief itself.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Atheist Myself Organization Positive Religion Thinking
Mockery of religion is one of the most essential things… one of the beginnings of human emancipation is the ability to laugh at authority.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Ability Authority Essential Oneself Religion
Since it is obviously inconceivable that all religions can be right, the most reasonable conclusion is that they are all wrong.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Conclusion Religion Right Wrong
I burned the candle at both ends and it often gave a lovely light.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Burn Candle End Light Love Myself
Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty and wisdom will come to you that way.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Happiness Risk Thinking Truth Way Yourself
I am absolutely convinced that religion is the main source of hatred in this world.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Hate Myself Religion World
The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Certain Divine Infant Ourselves Person
Why do humans exist? A major part of the answer: because Pikaia Gracilens survived the Burgess decimation.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Existence Human Survive War
Endless praise and adoration, limitless abnegation and abjection of self; a celestial North Korea.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

End Limitation Praise
If the Qur’an was the word of God, it had been dictated on a very bad day.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Bad Day God Word
I’m not afraid of being dead, that’s to say there’s nothing to be afraid of. I won’t know I’m dead, would be my strong conviction. And if I find that I’m alive in any way at all, that’ll be a pleasant surprise. I quite like surprises.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Afraid Death Myself Quite Strong
What do you most value in your friends? Their continued existence.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Existence Friendship Value Yourself
The one unforgivable sin is to be boring.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Boredom Forgiveness Oneself Sin
Thanks to the telescope and the microscope, religion no longer offers an explanation for anything important.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Important Microscope Offering Thankful
So there’s nothing more vulgar than the sound of someone saying, God Bless America, someone who doesn’t really believe it, but he thinks it will make him look good to other people. I think it’s the most nauseating spectacle.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Appearance Believe Myself Sound Talk Thinking
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 say that homosexuality is not just a form of sex, it’s a form of love, and it deserves our respect for that reason.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Form Love Myself Reason Respect Sex Sexuality
Skepticism rather than credulity is the highest principle that the human intellect can use to ennoble our existence.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Existence High Principle
Take the risk of thinking for yourself.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Risk Self Love Thinking Yourself
Religion makes kind people say unkind things: “I must prove my faith, so mutilate the genitals of my children.” They wouldn’t do that if God didn’t tell them to do so.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Children Cruelty Kind Myself People Religion
Human beings are pattern-seeking animals who will prefer even a bad theory or a conspiracy theory to no theory at all.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Human Pattern Seek Theory Willing
Philosophy begins where religion ends, just as by analogy chemistry begins where alchemy runs out, and astronomy takes the place of astrology.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Astronomy End Philosophy Place Religion
I’m not even an atheist so much as I am an antitheist; I not only maintain that all religions are versions of the same untruth, but I hold that the influence of churches, and the effect of religious belief, is positively harmful.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Atheist Harmful Hold Maintain Myself Positive Religion Truth
Who are your favourite heroines in real life? The women of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Iran who risk their lives and their beauty to defy the foulness of theocracy. Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Azar Nafisi as their ideal feminine model.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Ideal Life Live Modeling Reality Risk Woman
Religion is not the belief there is a god. Religion is the belief god tells you what to do.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Belief God Religion Yourself
One of the most repellent spectacles at election times is the pretense of piety on the part of people running for office.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Election Oneself People Run Time
The gods that we’ve made are exactly the gods you’d expect to be made by a species that’s about half a chromosome away from being chimpanzee.
CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS

Expectation God Species

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.

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Popular Authors

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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Christopher Hitchens Quotes