Christianity has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Christianity satisfies suddenly and perfectly man's ancestral instinct for being the right way up; satisfies it supremely in this, that by its… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
But the truth is that it is only by believing in God that we can ever criticise the Government. Once abolish the… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
The man of the true religious tradition understands two things: liberty and obedience. The first means knowing what you really want. The… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
I still hold. . .that the suburbs ought to be either glorified by romance and religion or else destroyed by fire from… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
For religion all men are equal, as all pennies are equal, because the only value of any of them is that they… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Life is serious all the time, but living cannot be. You may have all the solemnity you wish in your neckties, but… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
In truth the Church is too unique to prove herself unique. For most popular and easy proof is by parallel; and here… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
One of the chief uses of religion is that it makes us remember our coming from darkness, the simple fact that we… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
There is always in the healthy mind an obscure prompting that religion teaches us rather to dig than to climb; that if… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
In every serious doctrine of the destiny of men, there is some trace of the doctrine of the equality of men. But… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
The poetry of art is in beholding the single tower; the poetry of nature in seeing the single tree; the poetry of… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
If the world grows to worldly, it can be rebuked by the Church; but if the Church grows to worldly, it cannot… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
A cosmic philosophy is not constructed to fit a man; a cosmic philosophy is constructed to fit a cosmos. A man can… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
And it did for one wild moment cross my mind that, perhaps, those might not be the very best judges of the… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
The simple sense of wonder at the shapes of things, and at their exuberant independence of our intellectual standards and our trivial… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
The trouble with Christianity is, not that its failed, but that it's never been tried . . . not that it can't… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
The aim of good prose words is to mean what they say. The aim of good poetical words is to mean what they do… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Youth is always too serious, and just now it is too serious about frivolity. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Tradition does not mean a dead town; it does not mean that the living are dead but that the dead are alive. It means… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
It is shorter to state the things forbidden than the things permitted; precisely because most things are permitted and only a few things forbidden. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Everyone seems to assume that the unscrupulous parts of journalism will be the frivolous or jocular parts. This is against all ethical experience. Jokes… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
For Scotland has a double dose of the poison called heredity; the sense of blood in the aristocrat, the sense of doom in the… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Faith is always at a disadvantage; it is a perpetually defeated thing which survives all conquerors. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
A building is akin to dogma; it is insolent, like dogma. Whether or no it is permanent, it claims permanence, like a dogma. People… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
The triangle of truisms, of father, mother and child, cannot be destroyed; it can only destroy those civilizations which disregard it. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Criticism is only words about words, and of what use are words about such words as these? — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
What we suffer from today is humility in the wrong place...The old humility was a spur that prevented a man from stopping; not a… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Plato was only a Bernard Shaw who unfortunately made his jokes in Greek. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Music with dinner is an insult both to the cook and the violinist. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Eugenics asserts that all men must be so stupid that they cannot manage their own affairs; and also so clever that they can manage… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
