Christopher Hitchens, a popular figure in the word of journalism, literature, and public debate, was known for his eloquence, fearless critiques, and incisive intellect.
Hitchens, famous for his formidable rhetoric and rigid perspectives on different issues left a profound impact via his spoken and written words.
His ability to communicate complex ideas with clarity and humor made him a strong critic and an admired commentator.
Top Christopher Hitchens Quotes
“What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.” – Christopher Hitchens
“That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Owners of dogs will have noticed that, if you provide them with food and water and shelter and affection, they will think you are god. Whereas owners of cats are compelled to realize that, if you provide them with food and water and affection, they draw the conclusion that they are gods.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.” – Christopher Hitchens
“My own view is that this planet is used as a penal colony, lunatic asylum and dumping ground by a superior civilization, to get rid of the undesirable and unfit. I can’t prove it, but you can’t disprove it either.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I became a journalist because I did not want to rely on newspapers for information.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Take the risk of thinking for yourself, much more happiness, truth, beauty, and wisdom will come to you that way.” – Christopher Hitchens
“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
“Everybody does have a book in them, but in most cases that’s where it should stay.” – Christopher Hitchens
Also Read: Jalen Hurts Quotes (with Commentary)
Christopher Hitchens Quotes on Religion
“Religion poisons everything.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Faith is the surrender of the mind; it’s the surrender of reason, it’s the surrender of the only thing that makes us different from other mammals.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.” – Christopher Hitchens
“God did not create man in his own image. Evidently, it was quite the other way about.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The only position that leaves me with no cognitive dissonance is atheism. It is not a creed. Death is certain, replacing both the siren-song of Paradise and the dread of Hell. Life on this earth, with all its mystery and beauty and pain, is then to be lived far more intensely: we stumble and get up, we are sad, confident, insecure, feel loneliness and joy and love. There is nothing more; but I want nothing more.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Exceptional claims demand exceptional evidence.” – Christopher Hitchens
“What can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The person who is certain, and who claims divine warrant for his certainty, belongs now to the infancy of our species.” – Christopher Hitchens
“It is by the fortune of God that, in this country, we have three benefits: freedom of speech, freedom of thought, and the wisdom never to use either.” – Christopher Hitchens
“If God really wanted people to be free of [wicked thoughts], he should have taken more care to invent a different species.” – Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens Quotes on Politics
“The essence of tyranny is not iron law. It is capricious law.” – Christopher Hitchens
“One has to multiply reasons for not believing what one is told.” – Christopher Hitchens
“To be against dictatorship is easy. To be against democracy is, in many cases, to be an actual fighter for freedom.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I have always found it quaint and rather touching that there is a movement [Libertarianism] in the US that thinks Americans are not yet selfish enough.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The four most over-rated things in life are champagne, lobster, anal sex, and picnics.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The struggle for a free intelligence has always been a struggle between the ironic and the literal mind.” – Christopher Hitchens
“‘My country, right or wrong’ is a thing no patriot would ever think of saying except in a desperate case. It is like saying ‘My mother, drunk or sober.'” – Christopher Hitchens
“The grave will supply plenty of time for silence.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Politics is made with the head, not with other parts of the body or soul.” – Christopher Hitchens
“A state that dwarfs its men in order that they may be more docile instruments in its hands is a state that dwarfs its citizens.” – Christopher Hitchens
Inspirational Christopher Hitchens Quotes
“Never be a spectator of unfairness or stupidity. Seek out argument and disputation for their own sake; the grave will supply plenty of time for silence.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I try to deny myself illusions and accept that it’s unfair and that’s just how it is. That’s the stoical response.” – Christopher Hitchens
“One should strive to combine the maximum of impatience with the maximum of skepticism.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Courage is contagious. Courage of one kind gives support to every other form.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Beware the irrational, however seductive. Shun the ‘transcendent’ and all who invite you to subordinate or annihilate yourself.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Time spent arguing is, oddly enough, almost never wasted.” – Christopher Hitchens
“It’s not what you think, it’s how you think.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Those who seek out power are often least suited to hold it.” – 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
“Take the risk of thinking for yourself. Much more happiness, truth, beauty, and wisdom will come to you that way.” – Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens Quotes on Literature
“The only way to read a book is to see it as a minefield.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The struggle for a free intelligence has always been a struggle between the ironic and the literal mind.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Great writers are either husbands or lovers. Some writers supply the solid virtues of a husband: reliability, intelligibility, generosity, decency. There are other writers in whom one prizes the qualities of a lover, giving more than one asks and creating an endless desire for more.” – Christopher Hitchens
“To be the object of someone’s satire or derision is a kind of honor.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Literature is the most agreeable way of ignoring life.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Literature, not scripture, sustains the mind and—since there is no other metaphor—also the soul.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I became a journalist because I did not want to rely on newspapers for information.” – Christopher Hitchens
“What people forget is that every ‘torture victim’ is an individual.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The essence of literature is the war between emotion and intellect, between life and death.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Words are the small change of thought.” – Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens Quotes on Freedom of Speech
“My own opinion is enough for me, and I claim the right to have it defended against any consensus, any majority, anywhere, any place, any time.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Free speech means the right to shout ‘theatre’ in a crowded fire.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Everybody does have a book in them, but in most cases that’s where it should stay.” – Christopher Hitchens
“It is a slight service to the cause of freedom to be martyred, but a much greater service to preserve the right to call your enemies absurd.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The right to be heard does not automatically include the right to be taken seriously.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Bear in mind that the special mark of a scapegoat is that it is an innocent that is sacrificed for the sins of others. And make sure you are found guiltless of that.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Without the free mind there is no free society.” – Christopher Hitchens
“To whom do you award the right to decide which speech is harmful, or who is the harmful speaker? Or to determine in advance what are the harmful consequences going to be that we know enough in advance to prevent? To whom would you give this job? To whom are you going to award the task of being the censor?” – Christopher Hitchens
“If someone tells me that I’ve hurt their feelings, I say, ‘I’m still waiting to hear what your point is.'” – Christopher Hitchens
“Censorship is the worst enemy of truth and freedom.” – Christopher Hitchens
Funny Christopher Hitchens Quotes
“Everybody does have a book in them, but in most cases, that’s where it should stay.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The four most over-rated things in life are champagne, lobster, anal sex, and picnics.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I became a journalist partly so that I wouldn’t ever have to rely on the press for my information.” – Christopher Hitchens
“If you want to be a writer, a little talent is a nice thing to have.” – Christopher Hitchens
“You should be nicer to him,’ a schoolmate had once said to me of some awfully ill-favored boy. ‘He has no friends.’ This, I realized with a pang of pity that I can still remember, was absolutely true. A few years later I would be able to phrase the insight more succinctly: the reason that he had no friends was that he had no friends.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Cheap booze is a false economy.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Trust me, it’s not a good idea to tell your wife that her ass looks fat in her jeans. I tried it once and can testify that sleeping on the couch is not good for your back.” – Christopher Hitchens
“A melancholy lesson of advancing years is the realization that you can’t make old friends.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Owners of dogs will have noticed that, if you provide them with food and water and shelter and affection, they will think you are god. Whereas owners of cats are compelled to realize that, if you provide them with food and water and affection, they draw the conclusion that they are gods.” – Christopher Hitchens
“It’s not just that I’m a member of the male sex; I don’t even start to qualify until I’ve had the first coffee of the day.” – Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens Quotes on Journalism
“Journalism is not just a cause, it’s also a wacky profession.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Being a writer is what I am, rather than what I do.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Your ideal authors ought to pull you from the foundering of your previous existence, not smilingly guide you into a friendly and peaceable harbor.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I don’t have a career, I have a typewriter.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The journalistic vision sharpens to the point of maximum impact every event, every individual and social configuration; but the tip of the pen does not overtly editorialize.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed: everything else is public relations.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I became a journalist because I did not want to rely on newspapers for information.” – Christopher Hitchens
“To be a journalist is to walk with kings, socialize with the great and the good, and then to describe them as if they were crooks and you a whistleblower.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The essence of journalism is the ability to distinguish a significant story from its background noise.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I’ve always been very careful never to predict anything that has not already happened.” – Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens Quotes on Philosophy
“The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The only conversation worth having is about ideas.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Skepticism is the first step towards truth.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The grave will supply plenty of time for silence.” – Christopher Hitchens
“One must state it plainly. Religion comes from the period of human prehistory where nobody had the smallest idea what was going on.” – Christopher Hitchens
“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
“Philosophy begins where religion ends, just like by analogy chemistry begins where alchemy runs out, and astronomy takes the place of astrology.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Exceptional claims demand exceptional evidence.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Our greatest foe—the reflective instinct to take things for granted.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.” – Christopher Hitchens
Motivational Christopher Hitchens Quotes
“The four irreducible objections to religious faith: it wholly misrepresents the origins of man and the cosmos, it seeks to solve our dilemmas by invoking more mysteries, it asks us to accept things on faith, and it seeks to convince us that we are always being supervised.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Never be a spectator of unfairness or stupidity. Seek out argument and disputation for their own sake; the grave will supply plenty of time for silence.” – Christopher Hitchens
“What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Beware the irrational, however seductive. Shun the ‘transcendent’ and all who invite you to subordinate or annihilate yourself.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Take the risk of thinking for yourself, much more happiness, truth, beauty, and wisdom will come to you that way.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The struggle for a free intelligence has always been a struggle between the ironic and the literal mind.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Time spent arguing is, oddly enough, almost never wasted.” – Christopher Hitchens
“One should strive to combine the maximum of impatience with the maximum of skepticism.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Courage is the main quality of leadership, in my opinion, no matter where it is exercised. Usually it implies some risk—especially in new undertakings.” – Christopher Hitchens
“My advice to people today is as follows: if you take the game of life seriously, if you take your nervous system seriously, if you take your sense organs seriously, if you take the energy process seriously, you must turn on, tune in, and drop out.” – Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens Quotes on Culture and Society
“Culture and sophistication often entail a certain presumption, a certain denial of very hard-won insights.” – Christopher Hitchens
“What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence, especially in culture.” – Christopher Hitchens
“To be in opposition is not to be a nihilist. It is, on the contrary, to cherish and to nourish the roots of human reality.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Our culture’s obsession with vintage objects has rendered us unable to separate history from nostalgia.” – Christopher Hitchens
“One should strive to maintain a skepticism of the creeds and certainties of society.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks about society.” – Christopher Hitchens
“There is a relationship between the mind’s freedom and the liberation of the body in society.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Satire is a lesson, parody is a game, and society needs both.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The way a society judges itself is by how it treats its deviants.” – Christopher Hitchens
“In the battle for a free society, no idea can be declared off-limits.” – Christopher Hitchens
Christopher Hitchens Quotes on Science and Rationality
“Science is not a tyranny of experts but an attempt to explain and control the world by reasoned understanding.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Miracles do not happen in contradiction to nature, but only in contradiction to that which is known to us of nature.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it and is a precondition for it.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The only celestial authority I respect is the night sky.” – Christopher Hitchens
“Owners of dogs will have noticed that if you provide them with food, water, shelter, and affection, they will think you are god. Whereas owners of cats are compelled to realize that, if you provide them with food and water and affection, they draw the conclusion that they are gods.” – Christopher Hitchens
“The portable atheist is not an oxymoron but a necessity, for philosophy lives in every inquiry.” – Christopher Hitchens
“I became an atheist through argumentation and rational inquiry, which led me to always prefer the question ‘Why’ over the statement ‘Because.'” – Christopher Hitchens
“One must state it plainly. Religion comes from the period of human prehistory where nobody had the smallest idea what was going on. Science came from the enlightenment and understanding.” – Christopher Hitchens
“It is no coincidence that the rise of modern sciences and the impact of evidence-based inquiry have challenged the authority of religious texts.” – Christopher Hitchens
“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
Also Read: Stevie Nicks Quotes (with Commentary)
Final Thoughts
Christopher Hitchens’ quotes still offers rich insights and provoking thought on many subjects. His bold approach to debate and criticism challenged readers and listeners to reflect on their beliefs and consider various perspectives.
Hitchens’ legacy as a public intellectual is marked by his unwavering pursuit of truth, advocacy for secularism, and his deep dedication to the principles of free speech and rational thought.
His effect on discourse and critical thinking still lives on, solidifying his place as one of the most impactful thinkers of his time.