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Every one of the great revolutionists, from Isaiah to Shelley, have been optimists. They have been indignant, not about the badness of existence, but about the slowness of men in realizing its goodness.

Gilbert K. Chesterton

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Gilbert K. Chesterton
Age: 62 †
Born: 1874
Born: May 29
Died: 1936
Died: June 14
Autobiographer
Biographer
Crime Writer
Essayist
Historian
Illustrator
Journalist
Literary Historian
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Philosopher
Beaconsfield
Buckinghamshire
Gilbert Keith Chesterton
Gilbert K. Chesterton
Gilbert Chesterton
G.K. Chesterton
G. K. C.
Existence
Shelley
Great
Optimists
Every
Slowness
Men
Indignant
Badness
Optimist
Goodness
Revolutionists
Realizing
Isaiah

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Savages and modern artists are alike strangely driven to create something uglier than themselves. but the artists find it harder.
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A large section of the intelligentsia seems wholly devoid of intelligence.
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Never invoke the gods unless you really want them to appear. It annoys them very much.
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A man looking at a hippopotamus may sometimes be tempted to regard a hippopotamus as an enormous mistake but he is also bound to confess that a fortunate inferiority prevents him personally from making such mistakes.
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Agnostic is the Greek word, for the Latin word, for ignorant
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I say that a man must be certain of his morality for the simple reason that he has to suffer for it.
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All good men are international. Nearly all bad men are cosmopolitan. If we are to be international we must be national.
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The true object of all human life is play. Earth is a task garden heaven is a playground.
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I am not absentminded. It is the presence of mind that makes me unaware of everything else.
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He is a [sane] man who can have tragedy in his heart and comedy in his head.
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The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly the rich have always objected to being governed at all.
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When people begin to ignore human dignity, it will not be long before they begin to ignore human rights.
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Paradox - Truth standing on her head to get attention.
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And pray where in earth or heaven are there prudent marriages-Might as well talk about prudent suicides.
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Buddhism is not a creed, it is a doubt.
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There are many books which we think we have read when we have not. There are, at least, many that we think we remember when we do not. An original picture was, perhaps, imprinted upon the brain, but it has changed with our own changing minds. We only remember our remembrance.
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Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of readiness to die.
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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.
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The great ideals of the past failed not by being outlived (which must mean over-lived), but by not being lived enough. Mankind has not passed through the Middle Ages. Rather mankind has retreated from the Middle Ages in reaction and rout. The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting. It has been found difficult and left untried.
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