“It is not only possible to say a great deal in praise of play; it is really possible to say the highest things in praise of it. It might reasonably be maintained that the true object of all human life is play. Earth is a task garden; heaven is a playground.”
"Oxford from Without"
All Things Considered (1908)
Context: It is not only possible to say a great deal in praise of play; it is really possible to say the highest things in praise of it. It might reasonably be maintained that the true object of all human life is play. Earth is a task garden; heaven is a playground. To be at last in such secure innocence that one can juggle with the universe and the stars, to be so good that one can treat everything as a joke — that may be, perhaps, the real end and final holiday of human souls.
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G. K. Chesterton 229
English mystery novelist and Christian apologist 1874–1936Related quotes

Hellenica Bk. 7, as translated by Rex Warner in A History of My Times (1979) p. 398.

Memories of President Lincoln, 14
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Recollection by Gilbert J. Greene, quoted in The Speaking Oak (1902) by Ferdinand C. Iglehart and Latest Light on Abraham Lincoln (1917) by Ervin S. Chapman
Posthumous attributions

Propositions, 2
1870 - 1903, The Gentle Art of Making Enemies' (1890)

The Queen v. Justices of County of London, &c. (1893), L. R. 2 Q. B. 492.

Source: One Minute Nonsense (1992), p. 96
("Leela" is more commonly spelled "Lila")