Gilbert K. Chesterton

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

“Don't ever take a fence down until you know why it was put up.”

“Coincidences are spiritual puns.”

“Men feel that cruelty to the poor is a kind of cruelty to animals. They never feel that it is an injustice to equals; nay it is treachery to comrades.”

“The cosmos is about the smallest hole that a man can hide his head in.”

“Some men never feel small, but these are the few men who are.”

“The true object of all human life is play. Earth is a task garden; heaven is a playground.”

“Man seems to be capable of great virtues but not of small virtues; capable of defying his torturer but not of keeping his temper.”

“The object of a New Year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul and a new nose; new feet, a new backbone, new ears, and new eyes. Unless a particular man made New Year resolutions, he would make no resolutions. Unless a man starts afresh about things, he will certainly do nothing effective.”

“Buddhism is not a creed, it is a doubt.”

“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.”

“The paradox of courage is that a man must be a little careless of his life even in order to keep it.”

“Man is an exception, whatever else he is. If he is not the image of God, then he is a disease of the dust. If it is not true that a divine being fell, then we can only say that one of the animals went entirely off its head.”

“In matters of truth the fact that you don't want to publish something is, nine times out of ten, a proof that you ought to publish it.”

“What people call impartiality may simply mean indifference, and what people call partiality may simply mean mental activity.”

“Men always talk about the most important things to perfect strangers. In the perfect stranger we perceive man himself; the image of a God is not disguised by resemblances to an uncle or doubts of wisdom of a mustache.”

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

“We make our friends; we make our enemies; but God makes our next door neighbour.”

“Fable is more historical than fact, because fact tells us about one man and fable tells us about a million men.”

“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.”