That most risky and volatile of all things a self-pitying majority. Christopher Hitchens More Quotes by Christopher Hitchens More Quotes From Christopher Hitchens Authors who moan with praise for their editors always seem to reek slightly of the Stockholm syndrome. Christopher Hitchens editorspraisewriting Religion has run out of justifications. Thanks to the telescope and the microscope, it no longer offers an explanation of anything important. Where once it used to able, by its total command of a worldview, to prevent the emergence of rivals, it can now only impede and retard-or try to turn back-the measureable advances that we have made. Christopher Hitchens importantrunningscience It's a better tradition for people who think for themselves and who don't pray in aid of any supernatural authority. That's what you should be spending your life is in spreading and deepening that tradition. Christopher Hitchens prayingpeoplethinking One can't live without fear, it's a question of what is your attitude towards fear? I'm afraid of a sordid death. I'm afraid that I will die in an ugly or squalid way, and cancer can be very vigorous in that respect. Christopher Hitchens uglycancerattitude There are two clocks ticking in Iran. One is the democracy movement clock which is ticking now faster than it was but it's got a lot of catching up to do. And then there's the clock that's ticking towards a nuclear weaponry. Christopher Hitchens irandemocracytwo North Korea is a necrocracy, or a mauselocracy or a thanatocracy in which the one [Kim Il-sung] is diffused into being with the other [Kim Jong Il], and where both of them are said to have had miraculous births attended by miraculous phenomena such as, for example, birds singing in Korean, when they were born. Christopher Hitchens koreasingingbird I was brought up in a very naval, military, and conservative background. My father and his friends had very typical opinions of the British middle class - lower-middle class actually - after the war. My father broke into the middle class by joining the navy. I was the first member of my family ever to go to private school or even to university. So, the armed forces had been upward mobility for him. Christopher Hitchens militarywarfather I can't compose or play music; I'm not that fortunate. But I can write and I can talk and sometimes when I'm doing either of these things I realize that I've written a sentence or uttered a thought that I didn't absolutely know I had in me... until I saw it on the page or heard myself say it. Christopher Hitchens pagesplaywriting Human society is inconceivable unless words are to some extent bonds. Christopher Hitchens human-societyhumans Many of the points made by the antiwar movement have been consciously assimilated by the Pentagon and its lawyers and advisers. Precision weaponry is good in itself, but its ability to discriminate is improving and will continue to improve. Cluster bombs are perhaps not good in themselves, but when they are dropped on identifiable concentrations of Taliban troops, they do have a heartening effect. Christopher Hitchens troopsbombsmovement Principles have a way of enduring, as do the few irreducible individuals who maintain allegiance to them. Christopher Hitchens individualprinciplesway My chief consolation in this year of living dyingly has been the presence of friends. Christopher Hitchens chiefsconsolationyears For some reason, which I believe I can guess, the churches/mosques want control of people when or while they are the most vulnerable or suggestible. If they can't get them in school, then they get them when they are hungry, or frightened, or ill, or homeless, or unemployed. Same difference. Here's your gruel, and here's a tract. Christopher Hitchens differencesbelieveschool The Iranian people were converted to Islam not very much longer after the conquest of the Arab world by Islam, but they refused to adopt the Arabic language, and it's a great point of pride to them that Persian culture and the Persian language and Persian literature survived the conversion to Islam. And the conversion to Islam also was for most of them not the Sunni majority form, but the Shia one. So there's a great discrepancy between Iranian society and many other of what we think of as Arab Muslim States and systems. Christopher Hitchens discrepancies-betweenpridethinking The human wish to credit good things as miraculous and to charge bad things to another account is apparently universal. Christopher Hitchens creditgood-thingswish Primate and elephant and even pig societies show considerable evidence of care for others, parent-child bonding, solidarity in the face of danger, and so on. Christopher Hitchens elephantspigschildren You don't say 'they all do it' Christopher Hitchens knows Unlike other countries, it was founded on written proclamations. America is an ideal as well as a republic. Its documents are open to revisions. They're works in progress. There's an invitation to participate. Christopher Hitchens progresscountryamerica 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 anxietystrugglesleep The creation story is ridiculous garbage. And has given us a completely false picture of our origin as a species and the origins of the cosmos. If you want a good mythical story it would be the life of Socrates. Christopher Hitchens garbagecosmoswould-be
