Search quotes

Link	Quote	Tags	Author
929756e	The Iliad is only great because all life is a battle, The Odyssey because all life is a journey, The Book of Job because all life is a riddle.		G. K. Chesterton
387846d	That a good man may have his back to the wall is no more than we knew already, but that God could have His back to the wall is a boast for all insurgents forever. Christianity is the only religion on earth that has felt that omnipotence made God incomplete. Christianity alone felt that God, to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. For the o..		G. K. Chesterton
afd8bc2	They said that I should lose my ideals and begin to believe in the methods of practical politicians. Now, I have not lost my ideals in the least; my faith in fundamentals is exactly what it always was. What I have lost is my childlike faith in practical politics.	idealism politics ideals pragmatism	G. K. Chesterton
81a7980	Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth: this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert-himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt - the Divine Reason... The old humility was ..		G. K. Chesterton
f497910	I seem to remember only centuries of heroic war, in which you were always heroes--epic on epic, Iliad on Iliad, and you always brothers in arms. Whether it was but recently (for time is nothing), or at the beginning of the world, I sent you out to war. I sat in the darkness, where there is not any created thing, and to you I was only a voice commanding valour and an unnatural virtue. You heard the voice in the dark, and you never heard it a..		G. K. Chesterton
c376b3c	Where does a wise man hide a leaf? In the forest. But what does he do if there is no forest? He grows a forest to hide it in.		G K Chesterton
ba4470c	It may be conceded to the mathematicians that four is twice two. But two is not twice one; two is two thousand times one.		G. K. Chesterton
279f0fe	He wondered why the pelican was the symbol of charity, except it was that it wanted a good deal of charity to admire a pelican.	pelican	G. K. Chesterton
0153f94	No man should leave in the universe anything of which he is afraid.		G. K. Chesterton
59e63f3	Even the moon is only poetical because there is a man in the moon.		G. K. Chesterton
9f9b499	A naked moon stood in a naked sky.		G. K. Chesterton
55f71dd	He had found the thing which the modern people call Impressionism, which is another name for that final scepticism which can find no floor to the universe.		G. K. Chesterton
f18aae5	We all disapprove of prostitution; but we do not all approve of purity. The only way to discuss the social evil is to get at once to the social ideal. We can all see the national madness; but what is national sanity?	good national-troubles social-problems insanity	G. K. Chesterton
6b12bcb	Satan fell by the force of gravity.	satan pride sin	G. K. Chesterton
6ad69ea	The lost causes are exactly those which might have saved the world.		G. K. Chesterton
d4f1503	But though the essential of the woman's task is universality, this does not, of course, prevent her from having one or two severe though largely wholesome prejudices. She has, on the whole, been more conscious than man that she is only one half of humanity; but she has expressed it (if one may say so of lady) by getting her teeth into the two or three things which she thinks she stands for. I would observe here in parenthesis that much of t..		G. K. Chesterton
286f6be	Therefore it is the paradox of history that each generation is converted by the saint who contradicts it most.		G. K. Chesterton
803b3b7	I had thought of calling the next sort of superficial people the Idealists; but I think this implies a humility towards impersonal good they hardly show; so I call them the Autocrats. They are those who give us generally to understand that every modern reform will "work" all right, because they will be there to see. Where they will be, and for how long, they do not explain very clearly. I do not mind their looking forward to numberless live..		G. K. Chesterton
19e3771	Reason is itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our thoughts have any relation to reality at all. If you are merely a sceptic, you must sooner or later ask yourself the question, "Why should anything go right; even observation and deduction? Why should not good logic be as misleading as bad logic? They are both movements in the brain of a bewildered ape?" The young sceptic says, "I have a right to think for myself."..		G. K. Chesterton
016c0c0	The rich are the scum of the earth in every country.		G. K. Chesterton
8550ab5	The simplification of anything is always sensational.		G. K. Chesterton
cd43159	There is only one thing that it requires real courage to say, and that is a truism.		G. K. Chesterton
b142e44	The riddles of God are more satisfying than the solutions of man.		G. K. Chesterton
02a84b5	To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it.		G. K. Chesterton
652c723	All government is an ugly necessity.		G. K. Chesterton
c74d403	It is terrible to contemplate how few politicians are hanged.		G. K. Chesterton
5ba6cad	These are the days when the Christian is expected to praise every creed except his own.		G. K. Chesterton
d29cab4	A puritan is a person who pours righteous indignation into the wrong things.		G. K. Chesterton
e33104f	What embitters the world is not excess of criticism, but absence of self-criticism.		G. K. Chesterton
d6ea293	Plato was right, but not quite right.		G. K. Chesterton
0c44e5d	Never invoke the gods unless you really want them to appear. It annoys them very much.		G. K. Chesterton
6dcf8c3	I've searched all the parks in all the cities -- and found no statues of Committees.		G. K. Chesterton
d8d748f	The poor object to being governed badly, while the rich object to being governed at all.		G. K. Chesterton
e7b18de	It is only great men who take up a great space by not being there.		G. K. Chesterton
e634d23	A stiff apology is a second insult.		G. K. Chesterton
75f528d	It is always the secure who are humble.		G. K. Chesterton
ea0d46d	The one stream of poetry which is continually flowing is slang.		G. K. Chesterton
40d84ac	All slang is metaphor, and all metaphor is poetry.		G. K. Chesterton
38daee3	Whatever the word "great" means, Dickens was what it means.		G. K. Chesterton
7a81953	Dickens] was the character whom anybody can hurt and nobody can kill.		G. K. Chesterton
a26c3de	America has a new delicacy, a coarse, rank refinement.		G. K. Chesterton
d02375c	Misers get up early in the morning; and burglars, I am informed, get up the night before.		G. K. Chesterton
080809a	A]rt is limitation.[...] The most beautiful part of every picture is the frame.		G. K. Chesterton
9f5f3af	If a thing is worth doing, it is worth doing badly.		G. K. Chesterton

929756e

The Iliad is only great because all life is a battle, The Odyssey because all life is a journey, The Book of Job because all life is a riddle.

G. K. Chesterton

387846d

That a good man may have his back to the wall is no more than we knew already, but that God could have His back to the wall is a boast for all insurgents forever. Christianity is the only religion on earth that has felt that omnipotence made God incomplete. Christianity alone felt that God, to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. For the o..

G. K. Chesterton

afd8bc2

They said that I should lose my ideals and begin to believe in the methods of practical politicians. Now, I have not lost my ideals in the least; my faith in fundamentals is exactly what it always was. What I have lost is my childlike faith in practical politics.

idealism politics ideals pragmatism

G. K. Chesterton

81a7980

Modesty has moved from the organ of ambition. Modesty has settled upon the organ of conviction where it was never meant to be. A man was meant to be doubtful about himself, but undoubting about the truth: this has been exactly reversed. Nowadays the part of a man that a man does assert is exactly the part he ought not to assert-himself. The part he doubts is exactly the part he ought not to doubt - the Divine Reason... The old humility was ..

G. K. Chesterton

f497910

I seem to remember only centuries of heroic war, in which you were always heroes--epic on epic, Iliad on Iliad, and you always brothers in arms. Whether it was but recently (for time is nothing), or at the beginning of the world, I sent you out to war. I sat in the darkness, where there is not any created thing, and to you I was only a voice commanding valour and an unnatural virtue. You heard the voice in the dark, and you never heard it a..

G. K. Chesterton

c376b3c

Where does a wise man hide a leaf? In the forest. But what does he do if there is no forest? He grows a forest to hide it in.

G K Chesterton

ba4470c

It may be conceded to the mathematicians that four is twice two. But two is not twice one; two is two thousand times one.

G. K. Chesterton

279f0fe

He wondered why the pelican was the symbol of charity, except it was that it wanted a good deal of charity to admire a pelican.

pelican

G. K. Chesterton

0153f94

No man should leave in the universe anything of which he is afraid.

G. K. Chesterton

59e63f3

Even the moon is only poetical because there is a man in the moon.

G. K. Chesterton

9f9b499

A naked moon stood in a naked sky.

G. K. Chesterton

55f71dd

He had found the thing which the modern people call Impressionism, which is another name for that final scepticism which can find no floor to the universe.

G. K. Chesterton

f18aae5

We all disapprove of prostitution; but we do not all approve of purity. The only way to discuss the social evil is to get at once to the social ideal. We can all see the national madness; but what is national sanity?

good national-troubles social-problems insanity

G. K. Chesterton

6b12bcb

Satan fell by the force of gravity.

satan pride sin

G. K. Chesterton

6ad69ea

The lost causes are exactly those which might have saved the world.

G. K. Chesterton

d4f1503

But though the essential of the woman's task is universality, this does not, of course, prevent her from having one or two severe though largely wholesome prejudices. She has, on the whole, been more conscious than man that she is only one half of humanity; but she has expressed it (if one may say so of lady) by getting her teeth into the two or three things which she thinks she stands for. I would observe here in parenthesis that much of t..

G. K. Chesterton

286f6be

Therefore it is the paradox of history that each generation is converted by the saint who contradicts it most.

G. K. Chesterton

803b3b7

I had thought of calling the next sort of superficial people the Idealists; but I think this implies a humility towards impersonal good they hardly show; so I call them the Autocrats. They are those who give us generally to understand that every modern reform will "work" all right, because they will be there to see. Where they will be, and for how long, they do not explain very clearly. I do not mind their looking forward to numberless live..

G. K. Chesterton

19e3771

Reason is itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our thoughts have any relation to reality at all. If you are merely a sceptic, you must sooner or later ask yourself the question, "Why should anything go right; even observation and deduction? Why should not good logic be as misleading as bad logic? They are both movements in the brain of a bewildered ape?" The young sceptic says, "I have a right to think for myself."..