G

Gilbert K. Chesterton

73 quotes

G. K. Chesterton (1874–1936) was an English writer, philosopher, and literary critic known for his prolific output, quick wit, and paradoxical style of argument. The creator of the beloved Father Brown detective stories, Chesterton wrote on theology, philosophy, and social issues with a joyful exuberance that earned him the nickname "the prince of paradox."

“The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land it is at last to set foot on one's own country as a foreign land.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Travel

All Quotes by Gilbert K. Chesterton

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

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Poetry

“The family is the test of freedom because the family is the only thing that the free man makes for himself and by himself.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Family

“White... is not a mere absence of colour it is a shining and affirmative thing, as fierce as red, as definite as black... God paints in many colours but He never paints so gorgeously, I had almost said so gaudily, as when He paints in white.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

God

“To be clever enough to get all that money, one must be stupid enough to want it.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Money

“Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to that arrogant oligarchy who merely happen to be walking around.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Politics

“Marriage is an adventure, like going to war.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Marriage

“Democracy means government by the uneducated, while aristocracy means government by the badly educated.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Government

“Half a truth is better than no politics.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Politics

“True contentment is a thing as active as agriculture. It is the power of getting out of any situation all that there is in it. It is arduous and it is rare.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Power

“Happy is he who still loves something he loved in the nursery: He has not been broken in two by time he is not two men, but one, and he has saved not only his soul but his life.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Men

“Art, like morality, consists in drawing the line somewhere.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Art

“The word 'good' has many meanings. For example, if a man were to shoot his grandmother at a range of five hundred yards, I should call him a good shot, but not necessarily a good man.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Good

“A woman uses her intelligence to find reasons to support her intuition.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Intelligence

“Once I planned to write a book of poems entirely about the things in my pocket. But I found it would be too long and the age of the great epics is past.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Age

“The way to love anything is to realize that it may be lost.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Love

“I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought, and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Happiness

“Thieves respect property. They merely wish the property to become their property that they may more perfectly respect it.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Respect

“If I can put one touch of rosy sunset into the life of any man or woman, I shall feel that I have worked with God.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

God

“It is not funny that anything else should fall down only that a man should fall down. Why do we laugh? Because it is a gravely religious matter: it is the Fall of Man. Only man can be absurd: for only man can be dignified.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Funny

“The man who throws a bomb is an artist, because he prefers a great moment to everything.”

— Gilbert K. Chesterton

Great