What we dread about our neighbours, in short, is
not the narrowness of their horizon, but their superb tendency to
broaden it. And all aversions to ordinary humanity have this general
character. They are not aversions to its feebleness (as is pretended),
but to its energy. The misanthropes pretend that they despise humanity
for its weakness. As a matter of fact, they hate it for its strength. Of
course, this shrinking from the brutal vivacity and brutal variety of
common men is a perfectly reasonable and excusable thing as long as it
does not pretend to any point of superiority.
—G.K. Chesterton, Heretics.
Christian Origins
Everything else in the modern world is of
Christian origin, even everything that seems most anti-Christian. The
French Revolution is of Christian origin. The newspaper is of Christian
origin. The anarchists are of Christian origin. Physical science is of
Christian origin. The attack on Christianity is of Christian origin.
There is one thing, and one thing only, in existence at the present day
which can in any sense accurately be said to be of pagan origin, and
that is Christianity.
—G.K. Chesterton, Heretics.
—G.K. Chesterton, Heretics.
Mr. Smith
In the case of Smith, the name is so poetical
that it must be an arduous and heroic matter for the man to live up to
it. The name of Smith is the name of the one trade that even kings
respected, it could claim half the glory of that arma virumque which all
epics acclaimed. The spirit of the smithy is so close to the spirit of
song that it has mixed in a million poems, and every blacksmith is a
harmonious blacksmith. Even the village children feel that in some dim
way the smith is poetic, as the grocer and the cobbler are not poetic,
when they feast on the dancing sparks and deafening blows in the cavern
of that creative violence. The brute repose of Nature, the passionate
cunning of man, the strongest of earthly metals, the wierdest of earthly
elements, the unconquerable iron subdued by its only conqueror, the
wheel and the ploughshare, the sword and the steam-hammer, the arraying
of armies and the whole legend of arms, all these things are written,
briefly indeed, but quite legibly, on the visiting-card of Mr. Smith.
—G.K. Chesterton, Heretics.
—G.K. Chesterton, Heretics.
Perfect Happiness
The perfect happiness of men on the earth (if it
ever comes) will not be a flat and solid thing, like the satisfaction
of animals. It will be an exact and perilous balance; like that of a
desperate romance. Man must have just enough faith in himself to have
adventures, and just enough doubt of himself to enjoy them.
—G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy.
—G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy.
The Lion Lay Down with the Lamb
"The lion lay down with the lamb."
Remember that this text is too lightly interpreted. It is constantly assured, especially in our Tolstoyan tendencies, that when the lion lies down with the lamb the lion becomes lamb-like. But that is brutal annexation and imperialism on the part of the lamb. That is simply the lamb absorbing the lion instead of the lion eating the lamb. The real problem is—Can the lion lie down with the lamb and still retain his royal ferocity? That is the problem the Church attempted; That is the miracle she achieved.
—G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy.
Remember that this text is too lightly interpreted. It is constantly assured, especially in our Tolstoyan tendencies, that when the lion lies down with the lamb the lion becomes lamb-like. But that is brutal annexation and imperialism on the part of the lamb. That is simply the lamb absorbing the lion instead of the lion eating the lamb. The real problem is—Can the lion lie down with the lamb and still retain his royal ferocity? That is the problem the Church attempted; That is the miracle she achieved.
—G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy.
Man and Beast
Among all creatures that breathe on earth and crawl on it there is not anywhere a thing more dismal than man is.
—Zeus, in Homer, Iliad, XVII.446-447, translated by Richmond Lattimore (1951).
For the fate of the sons of men and the fate of beasts is the same. As one dies so dies the other; indeed, they all have the same breath and there is no advantage for man over beast, for all is vanity. All go to the same place. All came from the dust and all return to the dust. Who knows that the breath of man ascends upward and the breath of the beast descends downward to the earth?
—Solomon, Ecclesiastes.
—Zeus, in Homer, Iliad, XVII.446-447, translated by Richmond Lattimore (1951).
For the fate of the sons of men and the fate of beasts is the same. As one dies so dies the other; indeed, they all have the same breath and there is no advantage for man over beast, for all is vanity. All go to the same place. All came from the dust and all return to the dust. Who knows that the breath of man ascends upward and the breath of the beast descends downward to the earth?
—Solomon, Ecclesiastes.
Strange Truth
Whenever we feel there is something odd in Christian theology, we shall generally find that there is something odd in the truth.
—G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy.
How strange it was that Brother, starting from a position of manifest foolishness, proceeded to demonstrate such wisdom in every other area of thought. Perhaps that was one reason people believed the Bible: it integrated all of reality into a cohesive whole. It made sense of everything – though it itself was nonsense! Alex realized that, at one level, he actually really did believe the Bible. He believed all of it, and delighted in all of it – except the first four words: “In the beginning God.” That part he could not accept. And that meant all the rest would have to be rejected as well.
—Rich Coffeen, The Discipling of Mytra.
—G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy.
How strange it was that Brother, starting from a position of manifest foolishness, proceeded to demonstrate such wisdom in every other area of thought. Perhaps that was one reason people believed the Bible: it integrated all of reality into a cohesive whole. It made sense of everything – though it itself was nonsense! Alex realized that, at one level, he actually really did believe the Bible. He believed all of it, and delighted in all of it – except the first four words: “In the beginning God.” That part he could not accept. And that meant all the rest would have to be rejected as well.
—Rich Coffeen, The Discipling of Mytra.
The Existence of Evil
The strongest saints and the strongest skeptics alike took positive evil as the starting-point of their argument. If it be true (as it certainly is) that a man can feel exquisite happiness in skinning a cat, then the religious philosopher can only draw one of two deductions. He must either deny the existence of God, as all atheists do; or he must deny the present union between God and man, as all Christians do. The new theologians seem to think it a highly rationalistic solution to deny the cat.
—G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy.
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