Gilbert K. Chesterton
We actually love ourselves more than we love joy.Collection: Joy
The great saint may be said to mix all his thoughts with thanks. All goods look better when they look like gifts.Collection: Saint
I have no right to think for myself. I have no right to think at all.Collection: Thinking
Every true artist does feel, consciously or unconsciously, that he is touching transcendental truths; that his images are shadows of things seen through the veil. In other words, the natural mystic does know that there is something there, something behind the clouds or within the trees; but he believes that the pursuit of beauty is the way to find it; that imagination is a sort of incantation that can call it up.Collection: Believe
There are an infinity of angles at which one falls, only one at which one stands.Collection: Fall
Not only does "orthodox" no longer mean being right, it practically means being wrong.Collection: Mean
That all war is physically frightful is obvious; but if that were a moral verdict, there would be no difference between a torturer and a surgeon. There are certain intellectuals who are too bright to be content with merely praising peace but who are infuriated by anybody praising war. If no war is possible, all criminality has its chanceCollection: War
And it is always the humble man who talks too much; the proud man watches himself too closely.Collection: Humble
Every politician is emphatically a promising politician.Collection: Politician
Ingratitude is surely the chief of the intellectual sins of man. He takes his political benefits for granted, just as he takes the skies and the seasons for granted.Collection: Men
It was the people who did not care who filled the world with fire and oppression. It was the hands of the indifferent that lit the faggots; it was the hands of the indifferent that turned the rack.Collection: Fire
No man must be superior to the things that are common to men.... Not only are we all in the same boat, but we are all seasick.Collection: Men
Research is the search of people who don't know what they want.Collection: People
The humorous look of children is perhaps the most endearing of all the bonds that hold the Cosmos together.Collection: Children
He is a [sane] man who can have tragedy in his heart and comedy in his head.Collection: Encouragement
Life is indeed terribly complicated—to a man who has lost his principles.Collection: Men
Religious liberty might be supposed to mean that everybody is free to discuss religion. In practice it means that hardly anybody is allowed to mention it.Collection: Religious
There are two ways of dealing with nonsense in this world. One way is to put nonsense in the right place; as when people put nonsense into nursery rhymes. The other is to put nonsense in the wrong place; as when they put it into educational addresses, psychological criticisms, and complaints against nursery rhymes or other normal amusements of mankind.Collection: Educational
The trouble with Christianity is, not that its failed, but that it's never been tried . . . not that it can't remake the world, but that it's difficult.Collection: Failure
Certain new theologians dispute original sin, which is the only part of Christian theology which can really be proved.Collection: Christian
There is no obligation on us to be richer, or busier, or more efficient, or more productive, or more progressive, or any way worldlier or wealthier, if it does not make us happier.Collection: Simple
I should say that psycho-analysis was confession without absolution.Collection: Analysis
The poor complain that they are governed badly. The rich complain that they are governed at all.Collection: Complaining
That is the one eternal education: to be sure enough that something is true that you dare to tell it to a child.Collection: Children
America is the only country ever founded on a creed.Collection: Country
I've been to every park in every city and not seen a statue to a committee.Collection: Cities
Madness does not come by breaking out, but by giving in; by settling down in some dirty, little, self-repeating circle of ideas; by being tamed.Collection: Dirty
No man's really any good till he knows how bad he is, or might be.Collection: Men
Tradition does not mean a dead town; it does not mean that the living are dead but that the dead are alive. It means that it still matters what Penn did two hundred years ago or what Franklin did a hundred years ago; I never could feel in New York that it mattered what anybody did an hour ago.Collection: New York
If it's worth doing, it's worth doing badly. (on not perfectionism to put things off) .Collection: Inspirational
Every one on this earth should believe, amid whatever madness or moral failure, that his life and temperament have some object on the earth. Every one on the earth should believe that he has something to give to the world which cannot otherwise be given.Collection: Believe
Progress is the mother of all problems.Collection: Mother
The Reformer is always right about what's wrong. However, he's often wrong about what is right.Collection: Reformers
Whatever else we may say of our own age, for good or evil, nobody is likely to call it an Age of Reason.Collection: Evil
The essence of all pantheism, evolutionism, and modern cosmic religion is really this proposition: that nature is our mother. Unfortunately, if you regard Nature as a mother, you discover she is a step-mother.Collection: Mother
I had always felt life first as a story: and if there is a story there is a story-teller.Collection: Firsts
The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one’s own country as a foreign land.Collection: Country
Impartiality is a pompous name for indifference which is an elegant name for ignorance.Collection: Fun
If Christianity should happen to be true – that is to say, if its God is the real God of the universe – then defending it may mean talking about anything and everything.Collection: Real
I am not fighting a hopeless fight. People who have fought in real fights don’t, as a rule.Collection: Real
It’s the first effect of not believing in God that you lose your common sense.Collection: Firsts
There are two kinds of charlatan: the man who is called a charlatan, and the man who really is one. The first is the quack who cures you; the second is the highly qualified person who doesn’t.Collection: Firsts