We are learning to do a great many clever things. The next great task will be to learn not to do them. Gilbert K. Chesterton More Quotes by Gilbert K. Chesterton More Quotes From Gilbert K. Chesterton Let a man walk ten miles steadily on a hot summer's day along a dusty English road, and he will soon discover why beer was invented. Gilbert K. Chesterton summerbeermen Ritual will always mean throwing away something: destroying our corn or wine upon the altar of our gods. Gilbert K. Chesterton winegodmean When a politician is in opposition he is an expert on the means to some end; and when he is in office he is an expert on the obstacles to it. Gilbert K. Chesterton officeexpertsmean Man does not live by soap alone; and hygiene, or even health, is not much good unless you can take a healthy view of it or, better still, feel a healthy indifference to it. Gilbert K. Chesterton healthviewsmen The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective. Gilbert K. Chesterton new-yeareyeinspirational Blasphemy is an artistic effect, because blasphemy depends upon a philosophical conviction. Blasphemy depends upon belief and is fading with it. If any one doubts this, let him sit down seriously and try to think blasphemous thoughts about Thor. Gilbert K. Chesterton philosophicaldoubtthinking Islam was something like a Christian heresy. The early heresies had been full of mad reversals and evasions of the Incarnation, rescuing their Jesus from the reality of his body even at the expense of the sincerity of his soul. Gilbert K. Chesterton christianrealityjesus Dear Sir: Regarding your article 'What's Wrong with the World?' I am. Yours truly. Gilbert K. Chesterton deararticlesworld There's a lot of difference between listening and hearing. Gilbert K. Chesterton listening-and-hearingdifferenceslistening The sceptic ultimately undermines democracy (1) because he can see no significance in death and such things of a literal equality; (2) because he introduces different first principles, making debate impossible: and debate is the life of democracy; (3) because the fading of the images of sacred persons leaves a man too prone to be a respecter of earthly persons; (4) because there will be more, not less, respect for human rights if they can be treated as divine rights. Gilbert K. Chesterton divine-rightrightsmen Marxism: The theory that all the important things in history are rooted in an economic motive, that history is a science, a science of the search for food. Gilbert K. Chesterton importantfoodscience The purpose of Compulsory Education is to deprive the common people of their commonsense. Gilbert K. Chesterton educationpeopleschool Gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder. Gilbert K. Chesterton thankfulbeing-happyhappiness The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful. Gilbert K. Chesterton madchristiansorry The whole pleasure of marriage is that it is a perpetual crisis. Gilbert K. Chesterton crisispleasurelove There are no words to express the abyss between isolation and having one ally. It may be conceded to the mathematician that four is twice two. But two is not twice one; two is two thousand times one. Gilbert K. Chesterton alliesfourtwo People talk of the pathos and failure of plain women; but it is a more terrible thing that a beautiful woman may succeed in everything but womanhood. Gilbert K. Chesterton maybeautifulpeople Too much capitalism does not mean too many capitalists, but too few capitalists. Gilbert K. Chesterton too-muchdoemean It is not merely true that a creed unites men. Nay, a difference of creed unites men - so long as it is a clear difference. A boundary unites. Many a magnanimous Moslem and chivalrous Crusader must have been nearer to each other, because they were both dogmatists, than any two agnostics. "I say God is One," and "I say God is One but also Three," that is the beginning of a good quarrelsome, manly friendship. Gilbert K. Chesterton friendshipmentwo It is the beginning of all true criticism of our time to realize that it has really nothing to say, at the very moment when it has invented so tremendous a trumpet for saying it. Gilbert K. Chesterton speechcriticismpower
