G. K. Chesterton: Trending quotes (page 10)

“When learned men begin to use their reason, then I generally discover that they haven't got any.”

G. K. Chesterton

The Illustrated London News (7 November 1908)

Men , Learning

“Poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese.”

G. K. Chesterton

Alarms and Discursions (1910), 'Cheese,' p. 70

“A stiff apology is a second insult.”

G. K. Chesterton

"The Real Dr. Johnson," http://books.google.com/books?id=2mpaAAAAMAAJ&q=%22A+stiff+apology+is+a+second+insult%22&pg=PA121#v=onpage The Common Man (1950)

“Men may keep a sort of level of good, but no man has ever been able to keep on one level of evil.”

G. K. Chesterton book The Innocence of Father Brown

The Innocence of Father Brown (1911) The Flying Stars
The Father Brown Mystery Series (1910 - 1927)

Men , Evil

“There is only one thing that it requires real courage to say, and that is a truism.”

G. K. Chesterton

G.F. Watts http://books.google.com/books?id=PLpLAAAAMAAJ&q="There+is+only+one+thing+that+it+requires+real+courage+to+say+and+that+is+a+truism"&pg=PA17#v=onepage (1904)

Courage

“Neither reason nor faith will ever die; for men would die if deprived of either. The wildest mystic uses his reason at some stage; if it be only by reasoning against reason. The most incisive sceptic has dogmas of his own; though when he is a very incisive sceptic, he has often forgotten what they are. Faith and reason are in this sense co-eternal; but as the words are popularly used, as loose labels for particular periods, the one is now almost as remote as the other. What was called the Age of Reason has vanished as completely as what are called the Ages of Faith.”

G. K. Chesterton

Anti-Religious Thought In The Eighteenth Century http://www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/anti_religious_thought.txt; first published in "An Outline of Christianity : The Story of our Civilization", Vol. IV, Christianity and Modern Thought (1926)

Men , Age , Faith , Sense

“The thing that really is trying to tyrannize through government is Science. The thing that really does use the secular arm is Science. And the creed that really is levying tithes and capturing schools, the creed that really is enforced by fine and imprisonment, the creed that really is proclaimed not in sermons but in statutes, and spread not by pilgrims but by policemen – that creed is the great but disputed system of thought which began with Evolution and has ended in Eugenics. Materialism is really our established Church; for the Government will really help it to persecute its heretics.”

G. K. Chesterton book Eugenics and other Evils

Source: Eugenics and Other Evils (1922), Ch. VII: "The Established Church of Doubt" (pp. 76-77). https://books.google.com/books?id=m2xaAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA76&dq=%22the+thing+that+really+is+trying+to+tyrannise+through+government+is+science%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwj9uKmM_6jMAhUHgj4KHZr3DW0Q6AEILzAD#v=onepage&q=%22the%20thing%20that%20really%20is%20trying%20to%20tyrannise%20through%20government%20is%20science%22&f=false Dale Ahlquist, president and co-founder of the American Chesterton Society, commenting of this passage writes: "Eugenics is also about the tyranny of science. Forget the tired old argument about religion persecuting science. Chesterton points out the obvious fact that in the modern world, it is the quite the other way around." http://www.chesterton.org/lecture-36/ Lecture 36: Eugenics and Other Evils

School , Science , Help

“I know that journalism largely consists in saying 'Lord Jones Dead' to people who never knew Lord Jones was alive.”

G. K. Chesterton book The Wisdom of Father Brown

The Wisdom of Father Brown (1914) The Purple Wig
The Father Brown Mystery Series (1910 - 1927)

People , Dead

“Yet he is right enough about there being a white magic, if he only knows where to look for it.”

G. K. Chesterton

The Dagger with Wings (1926)

“If you know what a man's doing, get in front of him; but if you want to guess what he's doing keep behind him.”

G. K. Chesterton book The Innocence of Father Brown

The Innocence of Father Brown (1911) The Blue Cross
The Father Brown Mystery Series (1910 - 1927)

“There is no such thing on earth as an uninteresting subject; the only thing that can exist is an uninterested person.”

G. K. Chesterton book Heretics

Heretics (1905)

Personality

“Don't you believe people when they tell you that people sought for a sign, and believed in miracles because they were ignorant. They did it because they were wise, filthily, vilely wise—too wise to eat or sleep or put on their boots with patience.”

G. K. Chesterton book The Napoleon of Notting Hill

The Napoleon of Notting Hill (1904)
The Napoleon of Notting Hill (1904)

People , Sleep , Patience

“Either criticism is no good at all (a very defensible position) or else criticism means saying about an author the very things that would have made him jump out of his boots.”

G. K. Chesterton

Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens Chapter VI "Old Curiosity Shop" (1911)

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

G. K. Chesterton

Inglewood in Manalive (1912)

Light

“The act of defending any of the cardinal virtues has today all the exhilaration of a vice. Moral truisms have been so much disputed that they have begun to sparkle like so many brilliant paradoxes.”

G. K. Chesterton book The Defendant

"A Defence of Humilities"
The Defendant (1901)

“Misers get up early in the morning; and burglars, I am informed, get up the night before.”

G. K. Chesterton book Tremendous Trifles

Tremendous Trifles (1909)

Night

“An inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered; an adventure is an inconvenience rightly considered.”

G. K. Chesterton book All Things Considered

"On Running After One's Hat"
All Things Considered (1908)

“Dogma does not mean the absence of thought, but the end of thought.”

G. K. Chesterton

Ch I: The Victorian Compromise and Its Enemies ( p. 43 http://books.google.com/books?id=mKs-AAAAYAAJ&q=%22Dogma+does+not+mean+the+absence+of+thought+but+the+end+of+thought%22&pg=PA43#v=onepage)
The Victorian Age in Literature (1913)

“There is in Islam a paradox which is perhaps a permanent menace. The great creed born in the desert creates a kind of ecstasy out of the very emptiness of its own land, and even, one may say, out of the emptiness of its own theology. […] A void is made in the heart of Islam which has to be filled up again and again by a mere repetition of the revolution that founded it. There are no sacraments; the only thing that can happen is a sort of apocalypse, as unique as the end of the world; so the apocalypse can only be repeated and the world end again and again. There are no priests; and yet this equality can only breed a multitude of lawless prophets almost as numerous as priests. The very dogma that there is only one Mahomet produces an endless procession of Mahomets.”

G. K. Chesterton

Lord Kitchener (1917), pp. 7–8 https://archive.org/stream/kitchener00chesuoft#page/7/mode/2up

World , Heart

“Bosh," he said, "On what else is the whole world run but immediate impressions? What is more practical? My friend, the philosophy of this world may be founded on facts, but its business is run on spiritual impressions and atmospheres.”

G. K. Chesterton book The Club of Queer Trades

The Club of Queer Trades (1905) Ch. 2 "The Painful Fall of a Great Reputation"

World , Business