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The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton

Book by Gilbert K. Chesterton · 50 quotes · Men, Ifs, World

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The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton Quotes

“Because a girl should have long hair, she should have clean hair; because she should have clean hair, she should not have an unclean home; because she should not have an unclean home, she should have a free and leisured mother; because she should have a free mother, she should not have an usurious landlord; because there should not be a usurious landlord, there should be a redistribution of property; because there should be a redistribution of property, there shall be a revolution.”

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“It is not merely true that a creed unites men. Nay, a difference of creed unites men - so long as it is a clear difference. A boundary unites. Many a magnanimous Moslem and chivalrous Crusader must have been nearer to each other, because they were both dogmatists, than any two agnostics. "I say God is One," and "I say God is One but also Three," that is the beginning of a good quarrelsome, manly friendship.”

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“It is quite an old-fashioned fallacy to suppose that our objection to scepticism is that it removes the discipline from life. Our objection to scepticism is that it removes the motive power. Materialism is not a thing which destroys mere restraint. Materialism itself is the great restraint.”

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“Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of readiness to die.”

MeanFormDesireDiesStrongTermMemoriesCourageBraveryContradictionRemembranceVeteranBe BraveHave CourageReadinessBe CourageousVeterans DayOur TroopsOur VeteransBravery And CourageDesire To LiveHonoring VeteransAmerican MilitaryHonoring Our VeteransVeterans Day Thank YouGreat Veterans DayThank A VeteranStrong DesireThank You VeteranVeterans Day InspirationalVeterans Day PoemsWar VeteranHappy Veterans DayVeteran AppreciationFunny Veterans DayVeterans Day AppreciationPatriot DayAmerican VeteransArmisticeUs VeteransRemembrance DayBrave SoldiersHeroes DayVeterans And FreedomVeterans Day RemembranceChristian Veterans DayService And SacrificeVeterans BraveryArmistice DayPatriotic Veteran
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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.”

MenNeedsFactsWantedScienceWaterSinDoubtModernMastersRateAncientPracticalsNo DoubtImpressedInquiryPotatoesMiraculousWashing
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“Men can construct a science with very few instruments, or with very plain instruments; but no one on earth could construct a science with unreliable instruments. A man might work out the whole of mathematics with a handful of pebbles, but not with a handful of clay which was always falling apart into new fragments, and falling together into new combinations. A man might measure heaven and earth with a reed, but not with a growing reed.”

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“Drink because you are happy, but never because you are miserable. Never drink when you are wretched without it, or you will be like the grey-faced gin-drinker in the slum; but drink when you would be happy without it, and you will be like the laughing peasant of Italy. Never drink because you need it, for this is rational drinking, and the way to death and hell. But drink because you do not need it, for this is irrational drinking, and the ancient health of the world.”

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“The idea of private property universal but private, the idea of families free but still families, of domesticity democratic but still domestic, of one man one house - this remains the real vision and magnet of mankind. The world may accept something more official and general, less human and intimate. But the world will be like a broken-hearted woman who makes a humdrum marriage because she may not make a happy one; Socialism may be the world's deliverance, but it is not the world's desire.”

MenWorldHumansMayStillsIdeasRealInspirationDesireFaithHouseAcceptingVisionMankindBrokenUniversalRemainsPropertyDemocraticChristian InspirationalSocialismIntimateOfficialsOne ManHeartedPrivate PropertyDeliveranceMagnetBroken HeartedDomesticityHumdrum
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“The modern world is not evil; in some ways the modern world is far too good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is shattered (as Christianity was shattered at the Reformation), it is not merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone.”

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“The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone. Thus some scientists care for truth; and their truth is pitiless. Thus some humanitarians only care for pity; and their pity (I am sorry to say) is often untruthful.”

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“Instead of looking at books and pictures about the New Testament I looked at the New Testament. There I found an account, not in the least of a person with his hair parted in the middle or his hands clasped in appeal, but of an extraordinary being with lips of thunder and acts of lurid decision, flinging down tables, casting out devils, passing with the wild secrecy of the wind from mountain isolation to a sort of dreadful demagogy; a being who often acted like an angry god — and always like a god.”

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“Why do all the clerks and navvies in the railway trains look so sad and tired, so very sad and tired? I will tell you. It is because they know that the train is going right. It is because they know that whatever place they have taken a ticket for that place they will reach. It is because after they have passed Sloane Square they know that the next station must be Victoria, and nothing but Victoria. Oh, their wild rapture! oh, their eyes like stars and their souls again in Eden, if the next station were unaccountably Baker Street!”

IfsKnowsLooksSoulEyeNextStarsTakenStreetsTiredTrainStationsSquaresTicketsEdenRaptureVictoriaClerksVery SadBakersRailwaySo SadBaker Street
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