GKC on women

* If you convey to a woman that something ought to be done, there is always a dreadful danger that she will suddenly do it.
o The Secret of Father Brown (1927) The Song of the Flying Fish

GKC on good and evil

Men may keep a sort of level of good, but no man has ever been able to keep on one level of evil.

* The Innocence of Father Brown (1911) The Flying Stars

GKC on America

One of his hobbies was to wait for the American Shakespeare — a hobby more patient than angling. [Secret Garden]

GKC on youth and age

He admired youth because it was young and age because it was not.

GKC on courage

Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die. "He that will lose his life, the same shall save it," is not a piece of mysticism for saints and heroes. It is a piece of everyday advice for sailors or mountaineers. It might be printed in an Alpine guide or a drill book.

GKC pessimism

the optimist thought everything good except the pessimist, and that the pessimist thought everything bad, except himself.

* Chapter V : The Flag of The World

GKC on charity

charity to the deserving is not charity at all, but justice. It is the undeserving who require it, and the ideal either does not exist at all, or exists wholly for them.

GKC The heart has its reasons...

* There is a road from the eye to the heart that does not go through the intellect. Men do not quarrel about the meaning of sunsets; they never dispute that the hawthorn says the best and wittiest thing about the spring.
o "A Defence of Heraldry"

GKC on atheists

* If there were no God, there would be no atheists.
o Where All Roads Lead (1922)

GKC Science and religion

As for science and religion, the known and admitted facts are few and plain enough. All that the parsons say is unproved. All that the doctors say is disproved. That's the only difference between science and religion there's ever been, or will be.

* Michael Moon in Manalive (1912)

GKC Conservative

He is only a very shallow critic who cannot see an eternal rebel in the heart of the Conservative.

* Varied Types (1903)

GKC on Job

A man can no more have a private religion than he can have a private sun or private moon.

Highways

Once upon a time, a Latin American political party promised to help motorists save money on gasoline. How? By building highways that ran only downhill....

The people

it becomes necessary for the government to dissolve the people and elect another.

College

you have spent your whole life saving money so your student can go to college and get an education so that they will be laid off from a better job than the one you have.

Pelosi

Nancy Pelosi said that cutting the number of children would prove to be an economic boon:

“Well, the family planning services reduce cost. They reduce cost. The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children’s health, education and some of those elements are to help the states meet their financial needs. One of those - one of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government.”

Opera

opera is high-brow, and it is dying because of it.

Death of art

"That an art has become confined to high-brow tastes is a sign that it is dying."
-- Brandon Watson

The new martyrdom

"For those who have come to be viewed unfavorably in illuminati circles, there is the spreading of defamatory half lies, print and blog ridicule, rumor, gossip, and character assassination".

In early Christian days, bishops were killed. Nowadays the target is their souls.

Gregory on bishops

Pastors who lack foresight hesitate to say openly what is right because they fear losing the favor of men. As the voice of truth tells us, such leaders are not zealous pastors who protect their flocks, rather they are like mercenaries who take refuge in silence when the wolf appears. The Lord reproaches them through the prophet: They are like dumb dogs that cannot bark.

Complicity with evil

some teachings of the Church have been allowed to fall by the wayside through what could be called, charitably, a kind of benign pastoral neglect. For many, in our politically correct world, this is identified with compassion. In truth, it often entails a complicity or a compromise with evil. Bp. Finn at the USCCB

USCCB

nor is a conference or its president able to act in the name of all the bishops unless each and every bishop has given consent (canon 455, ß4).

Work

"Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work, so most people don't recognize them."

--- Ann Landers

GKC on madmen

Materialists and madmen never have doubts. ~ G.K. Chesterton

The people

the fabled East European parliament that, realizing it had lost popular favor but unwilling to dissolve itself and call new elections, resolved instead to dissolve the people.

Excuse, accuse

'Qui excusat non accusat,'”

China - the new model

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman expressed his admiration for the Chinese authoritarian regime, lauding it as "a reasonably enlightened group of people" that can, without any checks or balances, impose whatever policies it sees fit "to move a society forward in the 21st century."

Notre Dame

Notre Dame has become more of a brand and less of a community,

Abp Chaput

sin is real, and men and women can be corrupted by power and prosperity