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
Every great literature has always been allegorical - allegorical of some view of the whole universe. The 'Iliad' is only great because… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
We all feel the riddle of the earth without anyone to point it out. The mystery of life is the plainest part… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
For good or evil, a line has been passed in our political history; and something that we have known all our lives… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Life is not an illogicality; yet it is a trap for logicians. It looks just a little more mathematical and regular than… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
It is not only possible to say a great deal in praise of play; it is really possible to say the highest… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
At the back of our brains is a blaze of astonishment at our own existence. The object of the artistic and spiritual… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
At any innocent tea-table we may easily hear a man say, "Life is not worth living." We regard it as we regard… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
...But nature does not say that cats are more valuable than mice; nature makes no remark on the subject. She does not… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
Busy editors cannot be expected to put on their posters, "Mr. Wilkinson Still Safe," or "Mr. Jones, of Worthing, Not Dead Yet."… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
It might reasonably be maintained that the true object of all human life is play. Earth is a task garden; heaven is… — 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 Image
Youth is always too serious, and just now it is too serious about frivolity. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
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 Image
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 Image
Everyone seems to assume that the unscrupulous parts of journalism will be the frivolous or jocular parts. This is against all ethical experience. Jokes are generally honest. Complete solemnity is almost always dishonest. The writer of the snippet merely refers to a frivolous and fugitive fact in a frivolous and fugitive way. The writer of the leading article has to… — 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 Image
Faith is always at a disadvantage; it is a perpetually defeated thing which survives all conquerors. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
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 Image
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 Image
Criticism is only words about words, and of what use are words about such words as these? — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
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 nail in his boot that prevented him from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his efforts, which made him work harder. But the new humility makes a man doubtful about his… — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share
Plato was only a Bernard Shaw who unfortunately made his jokes in Greek. — Gilbert K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
