Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes

Suppose, my dear Chadd, suppose it is we who are the idiots because we are not afraid of devils in the dark?

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Dark Quotes , Devil Quotes

If the world grows to worldly, it can be rebuked by the Church; but if the Church grows to worldly, it cannot be adequately rebuked for worldlyness by the world.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Church Quotes , World Quotes

Democracy is reproached with saying that the majority is always right. But progress says that the minority is always right.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Democracy Quotes , Progress Quotes

Such professions as the soldier and the lawyer ... give ample opportunity for crimes but not much for mere illusions. ... If you have lost a battle you cannot believe you have won it; if your client is hanged you cannot pretend that you have gotten him off.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Believe Quotes , Opportunity Quotes

To complain that I could only be married once was like complaining that I had only been born once.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Complaining Quotes , Married Quotes

There are many ways to fall down, but there's only one way to stand up straight.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Fall Quotes , Way Quotes

Thanks are the highest form of thought.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Thank You Quotes , Gratitude Quotes

There is the great lesson of 'Beauty and the Beast,' that a thing must be loved before it is lovable.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Lessons Quotes , Fairytale Quotes

...there is in life an element of elfin coincidence which people reckoning on the prosaic may perpetually miss. As it has been well expressed in the paradox of Poe, wisdom should reason on the unforeseen.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Wisdom Quotes , People Quotes

Earth will grow worse till men redeem it, And wars more evil, ere all wars cease.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , War Quotes , Men Quotes

Men in England are ruled, at this minute by the clock, by brutes who refuse them bread, by liars who refuse them news, and by fools who cannot govern, and therefore wish to enslave.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Liars Quotes , Men Quotes

In the fairy tale, an incomprehensible happiness rests upon an incomprehensible condition. A box is opened and all evils fly out. A word is forgotten and cities perish. A lamp is lit and love flies away. An apple is eaten and the hope of God is gone.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Apples Quotes , Cities Quotes

The truth is, of course, that the curtness of the Ten Commandments is an evidence, not of the gloom and narrowness of a religion, but, on the contrary, of its liberality and humanity. It is shorter to state the things forbidden than the things permitted; precisely because most things are permitted, and only a few things are forbidden.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Christian Quotes , Humanity Quotes

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.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Charity Quotes , Pelicans Quotes

An imbecile habit has arisen in modern controversy of saying that such and such a creed can be held in one age but cannot be held in another. Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not credible in the twentieth. You might as well say that a certain philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on Tuesdays. You might as well say of a view of the cosmos that it was suitable to half-past three, but not suitable to half-past four. What a man can believe depends upon his philosophy, not upon the clock or the century.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Monday Quotes , Philosophy Quotes

Liberty is the very last idea that seems to occur to anybody, in considering any political or social proposal. It is only necessary for anybody for any reason to allege any evidence of any evil in any human practice, for people instantly to suggest that the practice should be suppressed by the police.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Practice Quotes , Ideas Quotes

There is nothing harder to learn than painting and nothing which most people take less trouble about learning.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Education Quotes , People Quotes

Education is the period during which you are being instructed by somebody you do not know, about something you do not want to know.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Education Quotes , Teaching Quotes

The Party System was founded on one national notion of fair play. It was the notion that folly and futility should be fairly divided between both sides.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Party Quotes , Humor Quotes

If we want to give poor people soap we must set out deliberately to give them luxuries. If we will not make them rich enough to be clean, then empathically we must do what we did with the saints. We must reverence them for being dirty.

5 years ago

Message Copied

Tags : Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes , Dirty Quotes , Luxury Quotes