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Morality comes from humanism and is stolen by religion for its own purposes.

Christopher Hitchens

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Christopher Hitchens
Age: 62 †
Born: 1949
Born: April 13
Died: 2011
Died: December 15
Author
Autobiographer
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Political Scientist
Writer
Portsmouth
England
Christopher Eric Hitchens
Stolen
Purposes
Morality
Purpose
Religion
Comes
Humanism

More quotes by Christopher Hitchens

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A celebrity is well known for being well known. I'm relatively well known - but for what I've written and said, or so I fondly imagine.
Christopher Hitchens
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Shepherds don't look after sheep because they love them - although I do think some shepherds like their sheep too much. They look after their sheep so they can, first, fleece them and second, turn them into meat. That's much more like the priesthood as I know it.
Christopher Hitchens
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So far, I have decided to take whatever my disease can throw at me, and to stay combative even while taking the measure of my inevitable decline. I repeat, this is no more than what a healthy person has to do in slower motion.
Christopher Hitchens
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I've been writing a lot about a new form of Russian imperialism. Actually, Russian Orthodox imperialism. It's very little remarked that the cement, the political, ideological cement of the Russian regime now, communism having collapsed and imploded, is increasingly a confessional one.
Christopher Hitchens
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The only real radicalism in our time will come as it always has—from people who insist on thinking for themselves and who reject party-mindedness.
Christopher Hitchens
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Yes, I, well, when I write, as often as I can, I try to write as if I'm talking to people. It doesn't always work, and one shouldn't always try it, but I try and write as if I am talking, and trying to engage the reader in conversation.
Christopher Hitchens
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I apply the Abraham Lincoln test for moral casuistry: 'If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong.' Well, then, if waterboarding does not constitute torture, then there is no such thing as torture.
Christopher Hitchens
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I say 'Merry Christmas' to people I don't know, or to people I know are Christians. I say 'Happy Hanukkah' to people I know to be or suspect to be Jewish. And I don't say 'Happy Kwanzaa,' because I think African Americans get enough insults all year round.
Christopher Hitchens
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There is no reason at all why there aren't enough people to guard New Orleans and to help stabilise Baghdad.
Christopher Hitchens
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The Postmodernists' tyranny wears people down by boredom and semi-literate prose.
Christopher Hitchens
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The Koran shows every sign of being thrown together by human beings, as do all the other holy books.
Christopher Hitchens
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In particular, it is absurd to hope to banish envy of other people's possessions or fortunes, if only because the spirit of envy can lead to emulation and ambition and have positive consequences.
Christopher Hitchens
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A good liar must have a good memory. Kissinger is a stupendous liar with a remarkable memory.
Christopher Hitchens
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If you gave [Jerry] Falwell an enema he could be buried in a matchbox.
Christopher Hitchens
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I appear as a skeptic, who believes that doubt is the great engine, the great fuel of all inquiry, all discovery and all innovation.
Christopher Hitchens
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Talking, it seemed to me, was the point of adult existence.
Christopher Hitchens
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Anyone who can look me in the eye and say they prefer the story of Moses or Jesus or Mohammed to the life of Socrates is intellectually defective.
Christopher Hitchens
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I'm a single-issue voter, to get straight to the point. I'm really only interested in the candidate who's toughest and least apologetic when it comes to the confrontation with Islamic Jihadism.
Christopher Hitchens
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Henry Kissinger should have the door shut in his face by every decent person and should be shamed, ostracized and excluded.
Christopher Hitchens
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Literature, not scripture, sustains the mind and - since there is no other metaphor - also the soul.
Christopher Hitchens