Simone Weil on atheism

Only he who has measured the dominion of force, and knows how not to respect it, is capable of love and justice.

One of the most exquisite pleasures of human love — to serve the loved one without his knowing it — is only possible, as regards the love of God, through atheism.

Art is the symbol of the two noblest human efforts: to construct and to refrain from destruction.

Atheism turns out to be too simple. If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning…

C. S. Lewis1898–1963Mere Christianity

A young man who wishes to remain a sound Atheist cannot be too careful of his reading. There are traps everywhere⁠—‘Bibles laid open, millions of surprises,’ as Herbert says, ‘fine nets and stratagems.’ God is, if I may say it, very unscrupulous.

C. S. Lewis1898–1963Surprised by Joy (1955), Ch. XII: “Guns and Good Company”

If there is a God, atheism must strike Him as less of an insult than religion.

Goncourt brothersJanuary 24, 1868; translation from Robert Baldick (ed. and trans.) Pages from the Goncourt Journal (London: Oxford University Press, 1962) p. 135.

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