Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes

A society is in decay, final or transitional, when common sense really becomes uncommon.

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A good civilisation spreads over us freely like a tree, varying and yielding because it is alive. A bad civilisation stands up and sticks out above us like an umbrella-artificial, mathematical in shape; not merely universal, but uniform.

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I need not pause to explain that crime is not a disease. It is criminology that is a disease.

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Is there anyone... who will maintain that the Party System could have been created by people particularly fond of truth?

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The men of the East may spell the stars, And times and triumphs mark, But the men signed of the cross of Christ Go gaily in the dark.

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Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very seldom. I am not, as will be seen, in any sense attacking logic: I only say that this danger does lie in logic, not in imagination.

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The voice of the special rebels and prophets, recommending discontent, should, as I have said, sound now and then suddenly, like a trumpet. But the voices of the saints and sages, recommending contentment, should sound unceasingly, like the sea.

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Liberty is the very last idea that seems to occur to anybody, in considering any political or social proposal. It is only necessary for anybody for any reason to allege any evidence of any evil in any human practice, for people instantly to suggest that the practice should be suppressed by the police.

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The classes that wash most are those that work least.

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The academic mind reflects infinity, and is full of light by the simple process of being shallow and standing still.

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

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The scientific facts, which were supposed to contradict the faith in the nineteenth century, are nearly all of them regarded as unscientific fictions in the twentieth century.

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Civilization has run on ahead of the soul of man, and is producing faster than he can think and give thanks.

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When people begin to ignore human dignity, it will not be long before they begin to ignore human rights.

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For us who live in cities Nature is not natural. Nature is supernatural. Just as monks watched and strove to get a glimpse of heaven, so we watch and strive to get a glimpse of earth. It is as if men had cake and wine every day but were sometimes allowed common bread.

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The criminal is the creative artist; the detective only the critic.

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It is cold anarchy to say that all men are to meddle in all men'smarriages. It is cold anarchy to say that any doctor may seize andsegregate anyone he likes. But it is not anarchy to say that a fewgreat hygienists might enclose or limit the life of all citizens,as nurses do with a family of children. It is not anarchy, it istyranny; but tyranny is a workable thing.

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Modern masters of science are much impressed with the need of beginning all inquiry with a fact. The ancient masters of religion were quite equally impressed with that necessity. They began with the fact of sin-a fact as practical as potatoes. Whether or not man could be washed in miraculous waters, there was no doubt at any rate that he wanted washing.

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Man must have just enough faith in himself to have adventures, and just enough doubt of himself to enjoy them.

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Some men never feel small, but these are the few men who are.

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