“I am not an atheist but an earthiest.”

— Edward Abbey , book Desert Solitaire

"Down the River", p. 163
Desert Solitaire (1968)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "I am not an atheist but an earthiest." by Edward Abbey?

Edward Abbey 146

American author and essayist 1927–1989

Related quotes

“[I am] secular to the bones, but not an atheist.”

Martin Amis (1949) Welsh novelist

Quoted in Philip Ottermann, "Beyond belief," http://books.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2289254,00.html The Guardian (5 July 2008)

“Almighty God, I am sorry I am now an atheist, but have You read Nietzsche?”

John Fante book Ask the Dust

Source: Ask the Dust

“That God of the clergymen, He is for me as dead as a doornail. But am I an atheist for all that?”

Vincent Van Gogh (1853–1890) Dutch post-Impressionist painter (1853-1890)

In his letter to Theo, from Etten, c. 21 December 1881, Letter #164 http://webexhibits.org/vangogh/letter/10/164.htm, as translated by Mrs. Johanna van Gogh-Bonger, as published in The Complete Letters of Vincent van Gogh (1991) edited by Robert Harrison] 
1880s, 1881
Context: That God of the clergymen, He is for me as dead as a doornail. But am I an atheist for all that? The clergymen consider me as such — be it so; but I love, and how could I feel love if I did not live, and if others did not live, and then, if we live, there is something mysterious in that. Now call that God, or human nature or whatever you like, but there is something which I cannot define systematically, though it is very much alive and very real, and see, that is God, or as good as God. To believe in God for me is to feel that there is a God, not a dead one, or a stuffed one, but a living one, who with irresistible force urges us toward aimer encore; that is my opinion.

“I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it.”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

Free Inquiry (Spring 1982) 
General sources
Context: I am an atheist, out and out. It took me a long time to say it. I've been an atheist for years and years, but somehow I felt it was intellectually unrespectable to say one was an atheist, because it assumed knowledge that one didn't have. Somehow, it was better to say one was a humanist or an agnostic. I finally decided that I'm a creature of emotion as well as of reason. Emotionally, I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn't exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn't that I don't want to waste my time.