Top 1337 Quotes & Sayings by Gilbert K. Chesterton - Page 4

The wisest thing in the world is to cry out before you are hurt. It is no good to cry out after you are hurt; especially after you are mortally hurt. People talk about the impatience of the populace; but sound historians know that most tyrannies have been possible because men moved too late. it is often essential to resist a tyranny before it exists.

I don't need a church to tell me I'm wrong where I already know I'm wrong; I need a Church to tell me I'm wrong where I think I'm right

CIVILISATION is not to be judged by the rapidity of communication, but by the value of what is communicated.

It is always the secure who are humble.

If you argue with a madman, it is extremely probable that you will get the worst of it; for in many ways his mind moves all the quicker for not being delayed by the things that go with good judgment.

The modern habit of saying "This is my opinion, but I may be wrong" is entirely irrational. If I say that it may be wrong, I say that is not my opinion. The modern habit of saying "Every man has a different philosophy; this is my philosophy and it suits me" – the habit of saying this is mere weak-mindedness. A cosmic philosophy is not constructed to fit a man; a cosmic philosophy is constructed to fit a cosmos. A man can no more possess a private religion than he can possess a private sun and moon.

The more I considered Christianity, the more I found that while it had established a rule and order, the chief aim of that order was to give room for good things to run wild.

Feminists are those who cannot stand female characteristics.

We're all in the same boat, and we're all seasick.

Nothing taken for granted; everything received with gratitude; everything passed on with grace.

I believe in getting into hot water; it keeps you clean.

If there were no God, there would be no atheists.

The issue is now clear. It is between light and darkness and everyone must choose his side.

Gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.

Angels can fly because they take themselves lightly. Never forget that the devil fell by force of gravity. He who has the faith has the fun.

A really great person is the person who makes every person feel great.

All men are ordinary men; the extraordinary men are those who know it.

A thing constructed can only be loved after it is constructed; but a thing created is loved before it exists.

I've searched all the parks in all the cities - and found no statues of Committees.

Marriage halves our griefs, doubles our joys, and quadruples our expenses

God is not a symbol of goodness; goodness is a symbol of God

I wish we could sometimes love the characters in real life as we love the characters in romances. There are a great many human souls whom we should accept more kindly, and even appreciate more clearly, if we simply thought of them as people in a story.

I believe in preaching to the converted; for I have generally found that the converted do not understand their own religion.

The one perfectly divine thing, the one glimpse of God's paradise given on earth, is to fight a losing battle - and not lose it.

The main point of Christianity was this: that Nature is not our mother: Nature is our sister.

The Universe is the most extraordinary masterpiece ever constructed by nobody.

For when we cease to worship God, we do not worship nothing, we worship anything.

[No society can survive the socialist] fallacy that there is an absolutely unlimited number of inspired officials and an absolutely unlimited amount of money to pay them.

The things we see every day are the things we never see at all.

Being a success at work is not worth it if it means being a failure at home.

Government has become ungovernable; that is, it cannot leave off governing. Law has become lawless; that is, it cannot see where laws should stop. The chief feature of our time is the meekness of the mob and the madness of the government.

The thing I hate about an argument is that it always interrupts a discussion.

O God of earth and altar, Bow down and hear our cry, Our earthly rulers falter, Our people drift and die; The walls of gold entomb us, The swords of scorn divide, Take not thy thunder from us, But take away our pride.

When people talk as if the Crusades were nothing more than an aggressive raid against Islam, they seem to forget in the strangest way that Islam itself was only an aggressive raid against the old and ordered civilization in these parts. I do not say it in mere hostility to the religion of Mahomet; I am fully conscious of many values and virtues in it; but certainly it was Islam that was the invasion and Christendom that was the thing invaded.

Original sin is the only doctrine that's been empirically validated by 2,000 years of human history.

We need to be reminded more than we need to be instructed

Gratitude produced the most purely joyful moments that have been known to man.

You cannot love a thing without wanting to fight for it.

We fear men so much, because we fear God so little. One fear cures another. When man's terror scares you, turn your thoughts to the wrath of God.

Reason is itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our thoughts have any relation to reality at all.

There's a lot of difference between listening and hearing.

Unless a man becomes the enemy of an evil, he will not even become its slave but rather its champion.

Thanks are the highest form of thought.

The most extraordinary thing in the world is an ordinary man and an ordinary woman and their ordinary children.

No man can break any of the Ten Commandments. He can only break himself against them.

But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun.; and every evening, "Do it again" to the moon. It may not be automatic monotony that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never gotten tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.

There are no uninteresting things, only uninterested people.

If there is one thing worse than the modern weakening of major morals, it is the modern strengthening of minor morals.

Tolerance is the virtue of those who don't believe anything.

Those who leave the tradition of truth do not escape into something which we call Freedom. They only escape into something else, which we call Fashion.

When belief in God becomes difficult, the tendency is to turn away from Him; but in heaven's name to what?

One must somehow find a way of loving the world without trusting it; somehow one must love the world without being worldly.

These are the days when the Christian is expected to praise every creed except his own.

The Declaration of Independence dogmatically bases all rights on the fact that God created all men equal; and it is right; for if they were not created equal, they were certainly evolved unequal. There is no basis for democracy except in a dogma about the divine origin of man.

Stick to the man who looks out of the window and tries to understand the world. Keep clear of the man who looks in at the window and tries to understand you.

We are all in the same boat, in a stormy sea, and we owe each other a terrible loyalty.

humor can get in under the door while seriousness is still fumbling at the handle

I believe what really happens in history is this: the old man is always wrong; and the young people are always wrong about what is wrong with him. The practical form it takes is this: that, while the old man may stand by some stupid custom, the young man always attacks it with some theory that turns out to be equally stupid.

Hell is God's great compliment to the reality of human freedom and the dignity of human choice.

Idolatry is committed, not merely by setting up false gods, but also by setting up false devils; by making men afraid of war or alcohol, or economic law, when they should be afraid of spiritual corruption and cowardice.