Chesterton Orthodoxy Quotes

He who wills to reject nothing, wills the destruction of will; for will is not only the choice of something, but the rejection of almost everything. ~ G.K. Chesterton

What is now called free thought is valued, not because it is free thought, but because it is freedom from thought; because it is free thoughtlessness. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Most Eugenists are Euphemists. I mean merely that short words startle them, while long words soothe them. And they are utterly incapable of translating the one into the other, however obviously they mean the same thing. Say to them "The persuasive and even coercive powers of the citizen should enable him to make sure that the burden of longevity in the previous generation does not become disproportionate and intolerable, especially to the females"; say this to them and they will sway slightly to and fro like babies sent to sleep in cradles. Say to them "Murder your mother," and they sit up quite suddenly. Yet the two sentences, in cold logic, are exactly the same. Say to them "It is not improbable that a period may arrive when the narrow if once useful distinction between the anthropoid homo and the other
animals, which has been modified on so many moral points, may be modified also even in regard to the important question of the extension of human diet"; say this to them, and beauty born of murmuring sound will pass into their face. But say to them, in a simple, manly, hearty way "Let's eat a man!" and their surprise is quite surprising. Yet the sentences say just the same thing. ~ G.K. Chesterton

The man who said, "Blessed is he that expecteth nothing, for he shall not be disappointed," put the eulogy quite inadequately and even falsely. The truth "Blessed is he that expecteth nothing, for he shall be gloriously surprised." The man who expects nothing sees redder roses than common men can see, and greener grass, and a more startling sun. Blessed is he that expecteth nothing, for he shall possess the cities and the mountains; blessed is the meek, for he shall inhereit the earth. Until we realize that things might not be we cannot realize that things are. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Not setting the 'proper and accepted' religious example for them conjured up images of the bad mother, the worst mother. Yet wouldn't the example of a mother being true to her journey, taking a stand against patriarchy, and questing for spiritual meaning and wholeness, even when it meant exiting circles of orthodoxy, be a worthwhile example? ~ Sue Monk Kidd

If you attempt an actual argument with a modern paper of opposite politics, you will have no answer except slanging or silence. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Scripture is our norming norm and tradition is our normed norm and that in a doctrinal controversy Scripture alone has absolute veto power while The Great Tradition (orthodox doctrine) has a vote but not a veto. ~ Roger E. Olson

What a glorious garden of wonders the lights of Broadway would be to anyone lucky enough to be unable to read. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

We have all forgotten what we really are. All that we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstasy only means that for one awful instant we remember that we forget. ~ G.K. Chesterton

He was one of those who are driven early in life into too conservative an attitude by the bewildering folly of most revolutionists. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Being a success at work is not worth it if it means being a failure at home. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

The modern man says, "Let us leave all these arbitrary standards and embrace liberty." This is, logically rendered, "Let us not decide what is good, but let it be considered good not to decide it. ~ G.K. Chesterton

The only true free-thinker is he whose intellect is as much free from the future as from the past. He cares as little for what will be as for what has been; he cares only for what ought to be. And for my present purpose I specially insist on this abstract independence. ~ G.K. Chesterton

I confess that I should feel a bit afraid of asking Sunday who he really is."

"Why," asked the Secretary, "for fear of bombs?"

"No," said the Professor, "for fear he might tell me. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Orthodoxy as right belief will cost us little; indeed, it will allow us to sit back with our Pharisaic doctrines, guarding the 'truth' with the purity of our interpretations. But orthodoxy, as believing in the right way, as bringing love to the world around us and within us … that will cost us everything. For to live by that sword, as we all know, is to die by it. ~ Peter Rollins

When there aren't enough hats to go around the problem isn't solved by lopping off some heads. ~ G.K. Chesterton

In our time the blasphemies are threadbare. Pessimism is now patently, as it always was essentially, more commonplace than piety. Profanity is now more than an affectation - it is a convention. The curse against God is Exercise 1 in the primer of minor poetry. ~ G.K. Chesterton

A sure sign of a crisis is the prevalence of cranks. It is characteristic of a crisis in theory that cranks get a hearing from the public which orthodoxy is failing to satisfy. ~ Joan Robinson

I hold it clear, therefore, if anything is clear about the
business, that the Eugenists do not merely mean that the mass of
common men should settle each other's marriages between them; the
question remains, therefore, whom they do instinctively trust when
they say that this or that ought to be done. What is this flying
and evanescent authority that vanishes wherever we seek to fix it?
Who is the man who is the lost subject that governs the Eugenist's
verb? In a large number of cases I think we can simply say that the
individual Eugenist means himself, and nobody else. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Biblical orthodoxy without compassion is surely the ugliest thing in the world. ~ Francis A. Schaeffer

Just as we all like love tales because there is an instinct of sex, we all like astonishing tales because they touch the nerve of the ancient instinct of astonishment. This is proved by the fact that when we are very young children we do not need fairy tales: we only need tales. Mere life is interesting enough. A child of seven is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door and saw a dragon. But a child of three is excited by being told that Tommy opened a door. Boys like romantic tales; but babies like realistic tales -- because they find them romantic. In fact, a baby is about the only person, I should think, to whom a modern realistic novel could be read without boring him. ~ G.K. Chesterton

If you have heard that I am wild, you can contradict the rumour,( ... ) I am tame. I am quite tame; I am about the tamest beast that crawls. I drink too much of the same kind of whisky at the same time every night. I even drink about the same amount too much. I go to the same number of public-houses. I meet the same damned women with mauve faces. I hear the same number of dirty stories - generally the same dirty stories. You may assure my friends, Inglewood, that you see before you a person whom civilization has thoroughly tamed. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Americans ... are the most idealistic people in the whole world. Their only danger is that the idealist can easily become the idolator. ~ G.K. Chesterton

For we human beings are used to inappropriate things; we are accustomed to the clatter of the incongruous; it is a tune to which we can go to sleep. If one appropriate thing happens, it wakes us up like the pang of a perfect chord. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Every man is womanised, merely by being born. They talk of the masculine woman; but every man is a feminised man. ~ G.K. Chesterton

The thing that cannot be defined is the first thing; the primary fact. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

Basil Grant and I were talking one day in what is perhaps the most
perfect place for talking on earth
the top of a tolerably deserted
tramcar. To talk on the top of a hill is superb, but to talk on the
top of a flying hill is a fairy tale. ~ G.K. Chesterton

White is not a mere absence of color; it is a shining and affirmative thing, as fierce as red, as definite as black. God paints in many colors; but He never paints so gorgeously, I had almost said so gaudily, as when He paints in white. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Precisely because our political speeches are meant to be reported, they are not worth reporting. Precisely because they are carefully designed to be read, nobody reads them. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

It does not, in the conventional phrase, accept the conclusions of science, for the simple reason that science has not concluded. To conclude is to shut up; and the man of science is not at all likely to shut up. ~ G.K. Chesterton

A puritan is a person who pours righteous indignation into the wrong things. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

The thing that really is trying to tyrannize through government is Science. The thing that really does use the secular arm is Science. And the creed that really is levying tithes and capturing schools, the creed that really is enforced by fine and imprisonment, the creed that really is proclaimed not in sermons but in statues, and spread not by pilgrims but by policemen - that creed is the great but disputed system of thought which began with Evolution and has ended in Eugenics. Materialism is really our established Church; for the government will really help it to persecute its heretics…I am not frightened of the word 'persecution'…It is a term of legal fact. If it means the imposition by the police of a widely disputed theory, incapable of final proof - then our priests are not now persecuting, but our doctors are. ~ G.K. Chesterton

I need the wisdom, reasoning, and apologetics of C. S. Lewis, though some of his theological beliefs are different from mine. I need the preaching and charisma of Charles Spurgeon, though his view of baptism is different from mine. I need the resurrection vision of N. T. Wright and the theology of Jonathan Edwards, though their views on church government are different from mine. I need the passion and prophetic courage of Martin Luther King Jr., the cultural intelligence of Soong-Chan Rah, and the Confessions of St. Augustine, though their ethnicities are different from mine. I need the justice impulse and communal passion of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, though his nationality is different from mine. I need the spiritual thirst and love drive of Brennan Manning and the prophetic wit of G. K. Chesterton, though both are Roman Catholics and I am a Protestant. I need the hymns and personal holiness of John and Charles Wesley, though some of their doctrinal distinctives are different from mine. I need the glorious weakness of Joni Eareckson Tada, the spirituality of Marva Dawn, the trusting perseverance of Elisabeth Elliot, the long-suffering spirit of Amy Carmichael, the transparency of Rebekah Lyons, the thankfulness of Ann Voskamp, the Kingdom vision of Amy Sherman, and the integrity of Patti Sauls, though their gender is different from mine. As St. Augustine reputedly said, "In nonessentials, liberty." To this we might add, "In nonessentials, open-minded receptivity." We Christians m ~ Scott Sauls

We will have have the dead at our councils. The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot papers, are marked with a cross. ~ G.K. Chesterton

This is the perpetual and pitiful tragedy of the practical man in practical affairs. He always begins with a flourish of contempt for what he calls theorizing and what people who can do it call thinking. He will not wait for logic-that is, in the most exact sense, he will not listen to reason. It will therefore appear to him an idle and ineffectual proceeding to say that there is a reason for his present failure. Nevertheless, it may be well to say it, and to try and make it clear even to him. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

Despite the almost aggressive touch of luxury in the fur coat, it soon became apparent that Sir Walter's large leonine head was for use as well as ornament, and he considered the matter soberly and sanely enough. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Men may keep a sort of level of good, but no man has ever been able to keep on one level of evil. That road goes down and down. ~ G.K. Chesterton

The telescope makes the world smaller; it is only the microscope that makes it larger. Before long the world will be cloven with a war between the telescopists and the microscopists. The first study large things and live in a small world; the second study small things and live in a large world. ~ G.K. Chesterton

In matters of truth the fact that you don't want to publish something is, nine times out of ten, a proof that you ought to publish it. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

Job is an optimist. He shakes the pillars of the world and strikes insanely at the heavens; he lashes the stars, but it is not to silence them; it is to make them speak. ~ G.K. Chesterton

We are all ordinary people. And it's the extraordinary people Who know it. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton

Truth is sacred; and if you tell the truth too often nobody will believe it. ~ G.K. Chesterton

You have no business to be an unbeliever. You ought to stand for all the things these stupid people call superstitions. Come now, don't you think there's a lot in those old wives' tales about luck and charms and so on, silver bullets included? What do you say about them as a Catholic?'
'I say I'm an agnostic,' replied Father Brown, smiling.
'Nonsense,' said Aylmer impatiently. 'It's your business to believe things.'
'Well, I do believe some things, of course,' conceded Father Brown; 'and therefore, of course, I don't believe other things. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Hang it all! what is a man ashamed of nowadays? ~ G.K. Chesterton

What a strange world in which a man cannot remain unique even by taking the trouble to go mad. ~ G.K. Chesterton

I prefer to call it reform. For reform implies form. ~ G.K. Chesterton

If the moderns really want a simple religion of love, they must look for it in the Athanasian Creed. The truth is that the trumpet of true Christianity, the challenge of the charities and simplicities of Bethlehem or Christmas Day never rang out more arrestingly and unmistakably than in the defiance of Athanasius to the cold compromise of the Arians. It was emphatically he who really was fighting for a God of Love against a God of colourless and remote cosmic control; the God of the stoics and the agnostics. It was emphatically he who was fighting for the Holy Child against the grey deity of the Pharisees and the Sadducees. He was fighting for that very balance of beautiful interdependence and intimacy, in the very Trinity of the Divine Nature, that draws our hearts to the Trinity of the Holy Family. His dogma, if the phrase be not misunderstood, turns even God into a Holy Family. ~ G.K. Chesterton

Though I believe in liberalism, I find it difficult to believe in liberals. ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton