When you need a quote from GKC for a particular day, you get out Michael W. Perry's excellent Chesterton Day by Day, an indispensable tool in a Chestertonian's toolbox. Unfortunately, today's quote is too long for me to key-in, so I'm just going to hit the highlight:
"Empires break; industrial conditions change; the suburbs will not last forever. What will remain? I will tell you: the Catholic saint will remain."
From The Ball and the Cross.
Thrilling Romance of Orthodoxy
5 months ago
1 comment:
copy and paste works well:
NOVEMBER 1st
ALL SAINTS' DAY
YOU cannot deny that it is perfectly possible that to-morrow morning in Ireland or in Italy there might appear a man not only as good but good in exactly the same way as St. Francis of Assisi. Very well; now take the other types of human virtue: many of them splendid. The English gentleman of Elizabeth was chivalrous and idealistic. But can you stand still in this meadow and be an English gentleman of Elizabeth? The austere republican of the eighteenth century, with his stern patriotism and his simple life, was a fine fellow. But have you ever seen him? Have you ever seen an austere republican? Only a hundred years have passed and that volcano of revolutionary truth and valour is as cold as the mountains of the moon. And so it will be with the ethics which are buzzing down Fleet Street at this instant as I speak. What phrase would inspire a London clerk or workman just now? Perhaps that he is a son of the British Empire on which the sun never sets; perhaps that he is a prop of his Trades Union, or a class-conscious proletarian something or other; perhaps merely that he is a gentleman, when he obviously is not. Those names and notions are all honourable, but how long will they last? Empires break; industrial conditions change; the suburbs will not last for ever. What will remain? I will tell you the Catholic saint will remain.
'The Ball and the Cross.'
(link)
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