Chesterton Orthodoxy Quotes & Sayings

Every man has forgotten who he is. One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self is more distant than any star.
Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know thyself.
We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. All that we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstasy only means that for one awful moment we remember that we forget. — G.K. Chesterton

There's a cure for aging that no one talks about. It's called learning. — Robin S. Sharma

There is only one thing that can never go past a certain point in its alliance with oppression
and that is orthodoxy. I may, it is true, twist orthodoxy so as partly to justify a tyrant. But I can easily make up a German philosophy to justify him entirely. — G.K. Chesterton

Oscar Wilde said that sunsets were not valued because we could not pay for sunsets. But Oscar Wilde was wrong; we can pay for sunsets. We can pay for them by not being Oscar Wilde. — G.K. Chesterton

People have fallen into a foolish habit of speaking of orthodoxy as something heavy, humdrum, and safe. There never was anything so perilous or so exciting as orthodoxy. It was sanity: and to be sane is more dramatic than to be mad. — G.K. Chesterton

Lettuce, greens and celery, though much eaten, are worse than cabbage, being equally indigestible without the addition of condiments. Besides, the lettuce contains narcotic properties. It is said of Galen, that he used to obtain from a head of it, eaten on going to bed, all the good effects of a dose of opium. — William Alcott

He who wills to reject nothing, wills the destruction of will; for will is not only the choice of something, but the rejection of almost everything. — G.K. Chesterton

An historic institution, which never went right, is really quite much of a miracle as an institution that cannot go wrong. — G.K. Chesterton

I want to push technology boundaries to be more efficient. — Robert Rodriguez

Let beliefs fade fast and frequently, if you wish institutions to remain the same. The more the life of the mind is unhinged, the more the machinery of matter will be left to itself. — G.K. Chesterton

There are an infinity of angles at which one falls, only one at which one stands. — Gilbert K. Chesterton

They do not destroy orthodoxy; they only destroy political courage and common sense. — G.K. Chesterton

You tell a kid he doesn't like to read, and he'll believe you — Gabrielle Zevin

Performing didn't feel comfortable until I was about 17. I loved to sing, but I always said I would never perform because I was too scared. — Seinabo Sey

A small circle is quite as infinite as a large circle; but, though it is quite as infinite, it is not so large. — G.K. Chesterton

Yes. You read that right. Evil Librarians control the world. They keep everyone in ignorance, teaching them falsehoods in place of history, geography, and politics. It's kind of a joke to them. Why else do you think the Librarians named themselves what they did? Librarians. LIE-brarians. Sounds obvious now, doesn't it? If you wish to smack yourself in the forehead and curse loudly, you may proceed to do so. I can wait. — Brandon Sanderson

I did try to found a little heresy of my own; and when I had put the last touches to it, I discovered that it was orthodoxy. — G.K. Chesterton

I perceive that it is far more practical to begin at the beginning and discuss theories. I see that the men who killed each other about the orthodoxy of the Homoousion were far more sensible than the people who are quarrelling about the Education Act. For the Christian dogmatists were trying to establish a reign of holiness, and trying to get defined, first of all, what was really holy. But our modern educationists are trying to bring about a religious liberty without attempting to settle what is religion or what is liberty. If the old priests forced a statement on mankind, at least they previously took some trouble to make it lucid. It has been left for the modern mobs of Anglicans and Nonconformists to persecute for a doctrine without even stating it. — G.K. Chesterton

So it does not matter (comparatively speaking) how often humanity fails to imitate its ideal; for then all its old failures are fruitful. But it does frightfully matter how often humanity changes its ideal; for then all its old failures are fruitless. — G.K. Chesterton

You see people who are disenfranchised elsewhere coming to Comic Con and making lifetime friends. I love seeing the outcasts of society all bonding together. — Scott Aukerman

The word 'heresy' not only means no longer being wrong; it practically means being clear-headed and courageous. The word 'orthodoxy' not only no longer means being right; it practically means being wrong. — G.K. Chesterton

The Byzantines hammered away at their hard and orthodox symbols, because they could not be in a mood to believe that men could take a hint. The moderns drag out into lengths and reels of extravagance their new orthodoxy of being unorthodox, because they also cannot give a hint
or take a hint. Yet all perfect and well-poised art is really a hint. — Gilbert K. Chesterton

The madman is the man who has lost everything except his reason ... — Gilbert K. Chesterton

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. — G.K. Chesterton

You must write for children in the same way as you do for adults, only better. — Maxim Gorky

Is it possible that God says every morning, "Do it again" to the sun; and every evening "Do it again" to the moon." from Orthodoxy. — G.K. Chesterton

It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never gotten tired of making them — Gilbert K. Chesterton

... Ending a conflict is not so simple, not just calling it off and coming home. Because the price for that kind of peace could be a thousand years of darkness for generation's Viet Nam borned. — Ronald Reagan