“Religion is an illusion and it derives its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires.”

— Sigmund Freud

A Philosophy of Life (Lecture 35)
1930s, "New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-analysis" https://books.google.com/books/about/New_Introductory_Lectures_on_Psycho_anal.html?id=hIqaep1qKRYC&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false (1933)
Source: New Introductory Lectures on Psychoanalysis

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 "Religion is an illusion and it derives its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires." by Sigmund Freud?

Sigmund Freud 147

Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psycho… 1856–1939

Related quotes

“The force which makes for war does not derive its strength from the interested motives of evil men; it derives its strength from the disinterested motives of good men.”

Norman Angell (1872–1967) British politician

Peace and the Public Mind (1935)
Context: The force which makes for war does not derive its strength from the interested motives of evil men; it derives its strength from the disinterested motives of good men. Pacifists have sometimes evaded that truth as making too great a concession to Mars, as seeming to imply (which it does not in fact) that in order to abolish war, men must cease to be noble.
Base motives are, of course, among those which make up the forces that produce war. Base motives are among those which get great cathedrals built and hospitals constructed-contractors' profit-seeking, the vested interests of doctors and clergy. But Europe has not been covered by cathedrals because contractors wanted to make money, or priests wanted jobs.

“Our Government springs from and was made for the people — not the people for the Government. To them it owes allegiance; from them it must derive its courage, strength, and wisdom.”

Andrew Johnson (1808–1875) American politician, 17th president of the United States (in office from 1865 to 1869)

Quote, First State of the Union Address (1865)
Context: Our Government springs from and was made for the people — not the people for the Government. To them it owes allegiance; from them it must derive its courage, strength, and wisdom. But while the Government is thus bound to defer to the people, from whom it derives its existence, it should, from the very consideration of its origin, be strong in its power of resistance to the establishment of inequalities. Monopolies, perpetuities, and class legislation are contrary to the genius of free government, and ought not to be allowed. Here there is no room for favored classes or monopolies; the principle of our Government is that of equal laws and freedom of industry. Wherever monopoly attains a foothold, it is sure to be a source of danger, discord, and trouble. We shall but fulfill our duties as legislators by according "equal and exact justice to all men," special privileges to none.

“The strength of a nation derives from the integrity of the home.”

Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher

“Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

Source: god is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything

“If we are weak, our country will be in jeopardy. It is the living lesson of human history of the rise and fall of nations. In order for a country not to fall, it must cultivate its own strength.”

Park Chung-hee (1917–1979) Korean Army general and the leader of South Korea from 1961 to 1979

As quoted in Toward Peaceful Unification: Selected Speeches & Interviews https://books.google.com/books?id=nNc2AzJmwPoC&pg=PA3&dq=%22There+was+little,+if+any,+feeling+of+loyalty+toward+the+abstract+concept+of+Korea+as+a+nation-state%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=IOkhVebpAYqWsAWOgILoCQ&ved=0CCgQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q&f=false (1978), Kwangmyong Publishing Company, p. 31.
1970s

“The world desires illusion (mundus vult decipi) — either the illusion antecedent to reason, which is poetry, or the illusion subsequent to reason, which is religion. And Machiavelli has said that whosoever wishes to delude will always find someone willing to be deluded.”

Miguel de Unamuno (1864–1936) 19th-20th century Spanish writer and philosopher

The Tragic Sense of Life (1913), Conclusion : Don Quixote in the Contemporary European Tragi-Comedy
Context: The philosophy of Bergson, which is a spiritualist restoration, essentially mystical, medieval, Quixotesque, has been called a demi-mondaine philosophy. Leave out the demi; call it mondaine, mundane. Mundane — yes, a philosophy for the world and not for philosophers, just as chemistry ought to be not for chemists alone. The world desires illusion (mundus vult decipi) — either the illusion antecedent to reason, which is poetry, or the illusion subsequent to reason, which is religion. And Machiavelli has said that whosoever wishes to delude will always find someone willing to be deluded. Blessed are they who are easily befooled!

“The mark of a truly civilized man is confidence in the strength and security derived from the inquiring mind.”

Felix Frankfurter (1882–1965) American judge

Dennis v. United States, 241 U.S. 494, 556 (1951).
Judicial opinions

“From principles is derived probability, but truth or certainty is obtained only from facts.”

Tom Stoppard (1937) British playwright

From principles is derived probability, but truth is obtained only from facts. - Jesse Olney (1798 - 1872), The National Preceptor (Goodwin, 1830), Lesson LXXXV: "Select Sentences," rule # 19 (p. 171).
Misattributed

“The first thing brought forth by the study of any religion, ancient or modern, is that it is based upon Fear, born of it, fed by it — and that it cultivates the source from which its nourishment is derived.”

Upton Sinclair book The Profits of Religion

Book One : The Church of the Conquerors, "The Great Fear"
The Profits of Religion (1918)

“I get along quite well with someone only when he is at his lowest point and has neither the desire nor the strength to restore his habitual illusions.”

Emil M. Cioran book The Trouble With Being Born

The Trouble With Being Born (1973)
Source: The Trouble with Being Born

“Religion is an illusion and it derives its strength from the fact that it falls in with our instinctual desires.”

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Sigmund Freud 147

Related quotes

Related topics