“Now for St. Francis nothing was ever in the background. We might say that his mind had no background, except perhaps that… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Thrift is the really romantic thing; economy is more romantic than extravagance... But the thing is true; economy, properly understood, is the… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“For most people there is a fascinating inconsistency in the position of St. Francis. He expressed in loftier and bolder language than… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Just as we all like love tales because there is an instinct of sex, we all like astonishing tales because they touch… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“It does not deal much with abstractions; it is the truest of all (...), because it does not speak much about love.… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“But nearly all of the people I have ever met in this western society in which I live would agree to the… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“If a man prefers nothing I can give him nothing. But nearly all people I have ever met in this western society… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“This is the first principle of democracy: that the essential things in men are the things they hold in common, not the… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“The most comic things of all are exactly the things most worth doing--such as making love.” — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“I want to adore the world, not as one likes a looking-glass, because it is one’s self, but as one loves a… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“I cannot understand the people who take literature seriously; but I can love them, and I do. Out of my love I… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Every act of will is an act of self-limitation. To desire action is to desire limitation. In that sense, every act is… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“But the truth is that there is no more conscious inconsistency between the humility of a Christian and the rapacity of a… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“What we need is not the cold acceptance of the world as a compromise, but some way in which we can heartily… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“A Second Childhood.” When all my days are ending And I have no song to sing, I think that I shall not… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Perhaps it would sound too paradoxical to say that these two saints saved us from Spirituality; a dreadful doom. Perhaps it may… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“To give up one's love for one's country is very great. But to give up one's hate for one's country, this may… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“The devotee is entirely free to criticise; the fanatic can safely be a sceptic. Love is not blind; that is the last… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“They are constantly colonists and emigrants ; they have the name of being at home in every country. But they are in… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Let us suppose we are confronted with a desperate thing – say Pimlico. If we think what is really best for Pimlico… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“To be in a romance is to be in uncongenial surroundings. To be born into this earth is to be born into… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“If the moderns really want a simple religion of love, they must look for it in the Athanasian Creed. The truth is… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“I never use paradox. The statements I make are wearisome and obvious common sense. I have even been driven to the tedium of reading… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Nothing, again, could be more prosaic and impenetrable than the domestic energies of Miss Diana Duke. But Innocent had somehow blundered on the discovery… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“The mass of men have been forced to be gay about the little things, but sad about the big ones. Nevertheless (I offer my… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“ask yourself how many people you have met who grumbled at a thing as incurable, and how many who attacked it as curable? How… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“The human race, to which so many of my readers belong, has been playing at children's games from the beginning, and will probably do… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Internationalism is in any case hostile to democracy….The only purely popular government is local, and founded on local knowledge. The citizens can rule the… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“There was a short railway official travelling up to the terminus, three fairly short market-gardeners picked up two stations afterwards, one very short widow… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Humility is the mother of giants. One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.” — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“There exists in such a case a certain institution or law; let us say for the sake of simplicity, a fence or gate erected… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“Man, by a blind instinct, knew that if once things were wildly questioned, reason could be questioned first. The authority of priests to absolve,… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
“It is idle to talk always of the alternative of reason and faith. Reason is itself a matter of faith. It is an act… — G.K. Chesterton Copy Share Image
