“We’re all really dependent in nearly everything, and we all make a fuss about being independent in something.” — G.K. Chesterton Dependent Copy Share Image
“People always brag about their vices; it is when they begin to brag about their virtues that they become insufferable.” — G.K. Chesterton Character Copy Share Image
“Whenever he gives advice it is always something as startling as an epigram, and yet as practical as the Bank of England.” — G.K. Chesterton Phrasing 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 Giants Copy Share Image
“Being surrounded with every conceivable kind of revolt from infancy, Gabriel had to revolt into something, so he revolted into the only… — G.K. Chesterton Revolt Copy Share Image
“Of the last two friends of yours who had the modern mind; one thought it wrong to eat fishes and the other… — G.K. Chesterton Fish Copy Share Image
“We are in the presence of a thousand lies all pointing with their fantastic fingers to one undiscovered truth.” — G.K. Chesterton Lies Copy Share Image
“I might point out that the rich do not so much buy honesty as curtains to cover dishonesty.” — G.K. Chesterton Dishonesty Copy Share Image
“the sixteenth-century schism was really a belated revolt of the thirteenth-century pessimists. It was a back-wash of the old Augustinian Puritanism against… — G.K. Chesterton Revolution Copy Share Image
“We may repeat here that these pages propose mainly to show one thing: that progress ought to be based on principle, while… — G.K. Chesterton Based Principle Copy Share Image
“We cannot teach citizenship if we are not citizens; we cannot free others if we have forgotten the appetite of freedom. Education… — G.K. Chesterton Freedom Copy Share Image
“The poet will be discontented even in the streets of heaven. The poet is always in revolt." "There again," said Syme irritably,… — G.K. Chesterton Discontent Copy Share Image
“The common conception among the dregs of Darwinian culture is that men have slowly worked their way out of inequality into a… — G.K. Chesterton Darwinian Copy Share Image
“Does it never strike you that doubt can be a madness, as well as faith? That asking questions may be a disease,… — G.K. Chesterton Asking questions Copy Share Image
“Mysticism conceives something transcending experience; religion seeks glimpses of a better good or a worse evil than experience can give. Reincarnation need… — G.K. Chesterton Mysticism Copy Share Image
“When I had a look at the lights of Broadway by night, I said to my American friends : "What a glorious… — G.K. Chesterton Broadway Copy Share Image
“Father Brown was made of two men. There was a man of action, who was as modest as a primrose and as… — G.K. Chesterton Free thought Copy Share Image
“His soul swayed in a vertigo of moral indecision. He had only to snap the thread of a rash vow made to… — G.K. Chesterton Anarchy Copy Share Image
“Saint-worship is not the same as hero-worship; it is a much less dangerous thing than hero-worship. For hero-worship generally means the absorption… — G.K. Chesterton Hero worship Copy Share Image
“We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are.… — G.K. Chesterton Common sense Copy Share Image
“To be in the weakest camp is to be in the strongest school. Nor can I imagine anything that would do humanity… — G.K. Chesterton Strength Copy Share Image
“The International Idea, The largest and the clearest, Is welding all the nations now, Except the one that’s nearest. This compromise has… — G.K. Chesterton Forgiveness Copy Share Image
“Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to… — G.K. Chesterton Culture Copy Share Image
“It is true that a man (a silly man) might make change itself his object or ideal. But as an ideal, change… — G.K. Chesterton Change Copy Share Image
“The ordinary detective discovers from a ledger or a diary that a crime has been committed. We discover from a book of… — G.K. Chesterton Books Copy Share Image
“The moderns say we must not punish heretics. My only doubt is whether we have the right to punish anybody else.” — G.K. Chesterton Anarchy Copy Share Image
“Is literature better, is politics better, for having discarded the moralist and the philosopher?” — G.K. Chesterton Books Copy Share Image
“There is a thought that stops thought. That is the only thought that ought to be stopped.” — G.K. Chesterton Thought Copy Share Image
“Men may keep a sort of level of good, but no man has ever been able to keep on one level of… — G.K. Chesterton Evil Copy Share Image
“Let us then, by all means, be proud of the virtues that we have not got; but let us not be too… — G.K. Chesterton Character Copy Share Image
“Life was a fly that faded, and death a drone that stung; The world was very old indeed when you and I… — G.K. Chesterton Death Copy Share Image
“I dare say that when I get out of this bed I shall do some deed of an almost terrible virtue.” — G.K. Chesterton Dare Copy Share Image
“It is vain for Mr. McCabe to say that a ballet is a part of him. He should be part of a… — G.K. Chesterton Ballet Copy Share Image
“As if everyone did not know that while saints can afford to be dirty, seducers have to be clean.” — G.K. Chesterton Dirty Copy Share Image
“Being a nation means standing up to your equals, whereas being an empire only means kicking your inferiors.” — G.K. Chesterton Empire Copy Share Image
“Complete self-confidence is not merely a sin; complete self-confidence is a weakness.” — G.K. Chesterton Confidence Copy Share Image
“We are in this fairyland on sufferance; it is not for us to quarrel with the conditions under which we enjoy this… — G.K. Chesterton Dreams Copy Share Image
“We say that the dangerous criminal is the educated criminal. We say that the most dangerous criminal now is the entirely lawless… — G.K. Chesterton Crime Copy Share Image
“The huge modern heresy is to alter the human soul to fit modern social conditions, instead of altering modern social conditions to… — G.K. Chesterton Heresy Copy Share Image
“The little sins are sometimes harder to confess than the big ones—but that's why it's so important to confess them.” — G.K. Chesterton Confess Copy Share Image
