Orthodoxy

Orthodoxy

by G.K. Chesterton

This book is meant to be a companion to "Heretics," and to put the positive side in addition to the negative. Many critics complained of the book because it merely criticised current philosophies without offering any alternative philosophy. This book is an attempt to answer the challenge. It is the purpose of the writer to attempt an explanation, not of whether the Christian Faith can be believed, but of how he personally has come to believe it. The book is therefore arranged upon the positive principle of a riddle and its answer. It deals first with all the writer's own solitary and sincere speculations and then with the startling style in which they were all suddenly satisfied by the Christian Theology. The writer regards it as amounting to a convincing creed. But if it is not that it is at least a repeated and surprising coincidence.

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Paperback, 168 pages

Published July 30th 2008 by Waking Lion Press (first published 1908)

tags: theology, catholic, spirituality, faith, philosophy, christianity, classics, religion, nonfiction, christian

Book Quotes

“Kada kažu da je Katolička Crkva staromodna, to je zapravo kompliment. Jer samo nešto što je istinski vrijedno može tako dugo živjeti.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“If evolution simply means that a positive thing called an ape turned very slowly into a positive thing called a man, then it is stingless for the most orthodox; for a personal God might just as well do things slowly as quickly, especially if, like the Christian God, he were outside time.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Imagination does not breed insanity. Exactly what does breed insanity is reason. Poets do not go mad; but chess-players do. Mathematicians go mad, and cashiers; but creative artists very seldom.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“And though St. John the Evangelist saw many strange monsters in his vision, he saw no creature so wild as one of his own commentators. The general fact is simple. Poetry is sane because it floats easily in an infinite sea; reason seeks to cross the infinite sea, and so make it finite. The result is mental exhaustion, like the physical exhaustion of”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Em qualquer esquina podemos encontrar alguém que profere a desvairada e blasfema afirmação de que ele pode estar errado. É claro que a sua visão deve ser a certa, ou então não é a sua visão. Todos os dias encontra-se alguém dizendo que, obviamente, o seu ponto de vista pode não ser o certo. Estamos em vias de produzir uma raça de homens mentalmente modestos demais para acreditar na tabuada. Corremos o risco de ver filósofos que duvidam da lei da gravidade como se ela fosse uma simples fantasia pessoal. Os zombadores de antigamente eram demasiado orgulhosos para serem convencidos; mas os de hoje são demasiado humildes para serem convencidos. Os pacíficos herdarão a terra; mas os ascetas modernos são pacíficos demais até mesmo para reivindicar a sua herança. É exatamente esse desamparo intelectual que constitui o nosso segundo problema.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Se alguém prefere o nada, nada lhe posso dar. Mas quase todas as pessoas que conheço nesta sociedade ocidental no seio da qual vivo concordam com a proposição geral de que precisamos dessa vida de romance prático; a combinação de alguma coisa que é estranha com alguma coisa que é segura. Precisamos ver o mundo de tal modo que nele se combine uma ideia de deslumbramento com uma ideia de acolhimento. Precisamos nos sentir felizes nessa terra deslumbrante sem nunca nos sentir meramente confortáveis.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“The favourite evolutionary argument finds its best answer in the axe. The Evolutionist says, "Where do you draw the line?" the Revolutionist answers, "I draw it HERE: exactly between your head and body." There must at any given moment be an abstract right and wrong if any blow is to be struck; there must be something eternal if there is to be anything sudden. Therefore”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Qualquer antidemocrata barato dos nossos dias afirmará, solenemente, que não há igualdade na natureza. Ele tem razão, mas não vê o 'addendum' lógico. Não há igualdade na natureza, mas também não há desigualdade. A desigualdade, assim como a igualdade, implica certo padrão de valor. Querer ver aristocracia dentro da anarquia dos animais é algo tão sentimental quanto querer ver democracia nessa mesma anarquia. Tanto a aristocracia quanto a democracia são ideais humanos, um proclamando que todos os homens têm valor, e outro proclamando que alguns homens têm mais valor.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“If evolution simply means that a positive thing called an ape turned very slowly into a positive thing called a man, then it is stingless for the most orthodox; for a personal God might just as well do things slowly as quickly, especially if, like the Christian God, he were outside time. But if it means anything more, it means that there is no such thing as an ape to change, and no such thing as a man for him to change into. It means that there is no such thing as a thing. At best, there is only one thing, and that is a flux of everything and anything. This is an attack not upon the faith, but upon the mind; you cannot think if there are no things to think about.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Some dogma, we are told, was credible in the twelfth century, but is not credible in the twentieth. You might as well say that a certain philosophy can be believed on Mondays, but cannot be believed on Tuesdays.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Em resumo: a fé democrática pretende que as coisas mais importantes sejam deixadas a cargo dos homens comuns - a procriação, a educação dos jovens, as leis do Estado. Isso é democracia, e foi nisso que eu sempre acreditei.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“É evidentemente impossível agora tomar como ponto de partida o fato do pecado, como nossos pais fizeram. Esse fato, que foi para eles (como é para mim) da mais clara evidência, é o verdadeiro fato que tem sido especialmente desvanecido ou negado.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“A natureza não diz nem que o gato é digno de inveja nem que o rato é digno de compaixão. Julgamos o gato superior porque temos (quase todos) uma filosofia particular, segundo a qual a vida é melhor do que a morte. Mas, se o rato fosse um rato alemão pessimista, poderia não pensar que o gato o tinha vencido. Poderia até julgar que fora ele quem vencera o gato, por ter chegado primeiro à sepultura. [...] Não se pode dizer que existe vitória ou superioridade na natureza, a menos que se siga alguma doutrina que afirme quais são as coisas superiores.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Those countries in Europe which are still influenced by priests, are exactly the countries where there is still singing and dancing and coloured dresses and art in the open-air. Catholic doctrine and discipline may be walls; but they are the walls of a playground. Christianity is the only frame which has preserved the pleasure of Paganism. We might fancy some children playing on the flat grassy top of some tall island in the sea. So long as there was a wall round the cliff's edge they could fling themselves into every frantic game and make the place the noisiest of nurseries. But the walls were knocked down, leaving the naked peril of the precipice. They did not fall over; but when their friends returned to them they were all huddled in terror in the centre of the island; and their song had ceased.”

― G.K. Chesterton

topics: Christianity, Gk Chesterton

“Paganism declared that virtue was in a balance; Christianity declared it was in a conflict: the collision of two passions apparently opposite. Of”

― G.K. Chesterton

“This, incidentally, is almost the whole weakness of Nietzsche, whom some are representing as a bold and strong thinker. No one will deny that he was a poetical and suggestive thinker; but he was quite the reverse of strong. He was not at all bold. He never put his own meaning before himself in bald abstract words: as did Aristotle and Calvin, and even Karl Marx, the hard, fearless men of thought. Nietzsche always escaped a question by a physical metaphor, like a cheery minor poet. He said, "beyond good and evil," because he had not the courage to say, "more good than good and evil," or, "more evil than good and evil." Had he faced his thought without metaphors, he would have seen that it was nonsense. So, when he describes his hero, he does not dare to say, "the purer man," or "the happier man," or "the sadder man," for all these are ideas; and ideas are alarming. He says "the upper man," or "over man," a physical metaphor from acrobats or alpine climbers. Nietzsche is truly a very timid thinker. He does not really know in the least what sort of man he wants evolution to produce. And if he does not know, certainly the ordinary evolutionists, who talk about things being "higher," do not know either. Then again, some people fall back on sheer submission and sitting still. Nature is going to do something some day; nobody knows what, and nobody knows when. We have no reason for acting, and no reason for not acting. If anything happens it is right: if anything is prevented it was wrong. Again, some people try to anticipate nature by doing something, by doing anything. Because we may possibly grow wings they cut off their legs. Yet nature may be trying to make them centipedes for all they know.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“The poet only asks to get his head into the heavens. It is the logician who seeks to get the heavens into his head. And it is his head that splits. It”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Precisamos ver o mundo de tal modo que nele se combine uma ideia de deslumbramento com uma ideia de acolhimento.”

― G.K. Chesterton

“Artistic paternity is as wholesome as physical paternity. Moreover,”

― G.K. Chesterton

“A imaginação não gera a insanidade. O que gera a insanidade é exatamente a razão. Os poetas não enlouquecem; mas os jogadores de xadrez sim.”

― G.K. Chesterton

G.K. Chesterton

Gilbert Keith Chesterton was one of the most influential English writers of the 20th century. His prolific and diverse output included journalism, philosophy, poetry, biography, Christian apologetics, fantasy and detective fiction.

Chesterton has been called the "prince of paradox". Time magazine, in a review of a biography of Chesterton, observed of his writing style: "Whenever possible Chesterton made his points with popular sayings, proverbs, allegories—first carefully turning them inside out.
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