Inspirational Quotes by G.K. Chesterton

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,”

“Few except the poor preserve traditions. Aristocrats live not in traditions but in fashions.”

“Nel piccolo mondo in cui i bambini vivono la loro esistenza, chiunque li allevi, non c'è nulla che venga percepito più acutamente dell'ingiustizia. Può darsi che sia solo una piccola ingiustizia quella che il bambino si trova a subire; ma il bambino è piccolo, e il suo mondo è piccolo, e il suo cavallino a dondolo è tante spanne più alto di lui quanto, in proporzione, un cavallo irlandese dalla grossa ossatura. Io, dentro di me, avevo sostenuto un perpetuo conflitto contro l'ingiustizia fin dalla prima infanzia.”

“But let the colours you lay on be violent, gorgeous, terrific colours, because my feelings are like that.”

“Enough House', said I; 'that's a curious name, miss.' 'Yes,' she replied; 'but it meant more than it said. It meant, when it was given, that whoever had this house could want nothing else.”

“We are three very old friends, Lanyon; we shall not live to make others.”

“Che quell'orrore insorgente fosse legato a lui più di una moglie, fosse più intimo di un occhio; che giacesse rinchiuso nella sua carne, dove lo sentiva ululare e lottare per venire alla luce; e che nei momenti di debolezza e quando si abbandonava al sonno lo dominasse e lo escludesse dalla vita.”

“Such is hope, heaven's own gift to struggling mortals...”

“He is an honorable, obstinate, truthful, high-spirited, intensely prejudiced, perfectly unreasonable man.”

“Whatever her tone with me happened to be, I could put no trust in it, and build no hope on it; and yet I went on against trust and against hope. Why repeat it a thousand times? So it always was.”

“It is the mark of a modest man to accept his friendly circle ready-made from the hands of opportunity; and that was the lawyer's way. His friends were those of his own blood or those whom he had known the longest; his affections, like ivy, were the growth of time, they implied no aptness in the object.”

“Each spoke in her own language; neither understood the other's words; both were very watchful, and intent to deduce from look and manner, what the unintelligible words meant.”

“I do not admit that theological points are small points. Theology is only thought applied to religion; and those who prefer a thoughtless religion need not be so very disdainful of others with a more rationalistic taste. The old joke that the Greek sects only differed about a single letter is about the lamest and most illogical joke in the world. An atheist and a theist only differ by a single letter; yet theologians are so subtle as to distinguish definitely between the two.”

“the English Crown and People, from a congress of British subjects in America: which, strange to relate, have proved more important to the human”

“settled for ever. It was the year of Our Lord one thousand seven hundred and seventy-five. Spiritual”

“if you deserve it, and repent in action—not in words. I want no more words.”

“Let me explain a little: Certain things are bad so far as they go, such as pain, and no one, not even a lunatic, calls a tooth-ache good in itself; but a knife which cuts clumsily and with difficulty is called a bad knife, which it certainly is not. It is only not so good as other knives to which men have grown accustomed. A knife is never bad except on such rare occasions as that in which it is neatly and scientifically planted in the middle of one's back. The coarsest and bluntest knife which ever broke a pencil into pieces instead of sharpening it is a good thing in so far as it is a knife. It would have appeared a miracle in the Stone Age. What we call a bad knife is a good knife not good enough for us; what we call a bad hat is a good hat not good enough for us; what we call bad cookery is good cookery not good enough for us; what we call a bad civilization is a good civilization not good enough for us. We choose to call the great mass of the history of mankind bad, not because it is bad, but because we are better. This is palpably an unfair principle. Ivory may not be so white as snow, but the whole Arctic continent does not make ivory black.”

“Humility is the luxurious art of reducing ourselves to a point, not to a small thing or a large one, but to a thing with no size at all, so that to it all the cosmic things are what they really are — of immeasurable stature. That the trees are high and the grasses short is a mere accident of our own foot-rules and our own stature. But to the spirit which has stripped off for a moment its own idle temporal standards the grass is an everlasting forest, with dragons for denizens; the stones of the road are as incredible mountains piled one upon the other; the dandelions are like gigantic bonfires illuminating the lands around; and the heath-bells on their stalks are like planets hung in heaven each higher than the other.”

“When some English moralists write about the importance of having character, they appear to mean only the importance of having a dull character.”

“The Goatherd and the Wild Goats A GOATHERD, driving his flock from their pasture at eventide, found some Wild Goats mingled among them, and shut them up together with his own for the night. The next day it snowed very hard, so that he could not take the herd to their usual feeding places, but was obliged to keep them in the fold. He gave his own goats just sufficient food to keep them alive, but fed the strangers more abundantly in the hope of enticing them to stay with him and of making them his own. When the thaw set in, he led them all out to feed, and the Wild Goats scampered away as fast as they could to the mountains. The Goatherd scolded them for their ingratitude in leaving him, when during the storm he had taken more care of them than of his own herd. One of them, turning about, said to him: “That is the very reason why we are so cautious; for if you yesterday treated us better than the Goats you have had so long, it is plain also that if others came after us, you would in the same manner prefer them to ourselves.” Old friends cannot with impunity be sacrificed for new ones.”