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GK Chesterton KNOWING & DOING 1 A Teaching Quarterly for Discipleship of Heart and Mind This article originally appeared in the Fall 2005 issue of Knowing & Doing. C.S. LEWIS INSTITUTE PROFILES IN FAITH G.K. Chesterton (1874-1936) Journalist, Author, Apologist, and Artist by Elesha Coffman former Editor, Christian History & Biography ilbert Keith Chesterton was, in a word, huge. I think there was a spiritual significance in GTall and weighing close to 400 pounds, he once Impressionism, in connection with this age as the age told a chauffeur who suggested he attempt to exit a of scepticism. I mean that it illustrated scepticism in car sideways, “I have no sideways.” But Chesterton the sense of subjectivism. Its principal was that if all loomed large in other ways as well. He commanded that could be seen of a cow was a white line and a the attention of an enormous audience through his purple shadow, we should only render the line and prolific production of newspaper columns, short sto- the shadow; in a sense we should only believe in the ries, novels, plays, poetry, and non-fiction. He line and the shadow, rather than in the cow. … The counted many of Britain’s leading lights among his philosophy of Impressionism is necessarily close to friends and enemies. And he exerted a powerful in- the philosophy of Illusion. And this atmosphere also fluence on the next generation of British Christian tended to contribute, however indirectly, to a certain writers, a group that included J.R.R. Tolkien, T.S. mood of unreality and sterile isolation that settled at Eliot, Dorothy Sayers, and C.S. Lewis. this time upon me; and I think upon many others. Nothing in Chesterton’s upbringing suggested such an important career. He was born to a con- The Impressionist, in Chesterton’s view, played ventionally liberal, middle-class family that fit com- too much the role of God, imagining himself to be fortably into the secular culture of the late Victorian creating the world entirely from his own perspec- era. Within that culture, Chesterton later wrote in tive. Chesterton could not handle that kind of re- his wonderful Autobiography, “We might almost say sponsibility, and it sent him into depression. that agnosticism was an established church.” His Fortunately, he found his way to the writings of education, at the Slade School of Art, was even Robert Browning, Robert Louis Stevenson, Walt more resolutely anti-religious, or at least anti-Chris- Whitman, and other authors who affirmed the posi- tian. A creative and restless mind such as tive existence of the outside world. Relieved of the Chesterton’s might have been expected to explore burden of creating reality by himself, Chesterton anything other than orthodoxy. emerged from his depression, left art school, and Chesterton did try many byways before begin- headed to London’s Fleet Street to turn his consider- ning the path of faith. Spiritualism, theosophy, and able writing skills toward a career in journalism. In other occult pursuits enjoyed a heyday at the turn of the back of his mind, another quest had begun as the twentieth century, and young Gilbert dabbled in well: the search for someone to thank for the beauty all of them. The nihilistic philosophy of Friedrich of the world he had rediscovered. Nietzsche also hung in the air, along with the dia- lectical materialism of Karl Marx and Friedrich Finding Faith Engels, while the psychological speculations of Chesterton’s slow journey toward Christian faith Sigmund Freud glimmered on the horizon. The ideas involved many pushes and pulls. The jaded Fleet that affected Chesterton most, though, related to the Street milieu and personal doubts about organized style then dominating the art world, Impressionism. religion, especially Catholicism, held him back. Many people today find the vague flowers and Meanwhile a growing attraction to Frances Blogg, a hazy haystacks of artists like Claude Monet sooth- devout Anglican whom he met at a London debat- ing, but they drove Chesterton to the brink of insan- ing salon, drew him forward. By the time he married ity. He reflected in the Autobiography, Frances, in 1901, he considered himself a Christian, Profiles in Faith—G.K. Chesterton 2 but his theology was far from mature. He honed his some people one could forgive, and some one beliefs through spirited printed debates. couldn’t: a slave who stole wine could be laughed Even before he adopted Christianity, Chesterton at; a slave who betrayed his benefactor could be was certain of what he disliked in modern thought. killed, and cursed even after he was killed.” Chris- The radical subjectivity of Impressionism led the tianity, by contrast, “divided the crime from the mind to a dead end. Enchantment with human po- criminal. The criminal we must forgive unto seventy tential, as expressed in Nietzsche’s Superman ideal times seven. The crime we must not forgive at all.” or in the milder optimism of average liberals, ig- In Orthodoxy, Chesterton displayed a mature nored too much evidence of frailty and corruption. and nuanced, albeit unconventional, faith, but his Materialism proclaimed that the visible world con- spiritual journey was not complete. He wondered stituted the whole of reality but failed to offer proof which church best embodied the fullness of the of this soul-numbing assertion. In short, the trendy Christian tradition. First Chesterton joined the philosophers who urged people to question every- Church of England—an obvious choice as the na- thing could not themselves answer the most basic tional church and the church of his wife, Frances. question, “And why should I listen to you?” He was concerned, though, that modernism seemed Chesterton first articulated a Christian response to be creeping into Anglican theology, undermining to modern skepticism in the pages of a socialist Lon- the supernatural claims that had drawn Chesterton don newspaper called the Clarion. Its editor, Robert to Christianity. Around 1911, he began to believe Blatchford, was a staunch atheist, but he nonethe- that only one church could withstand the onslaught less felt that faith deserved a fair hearing. For six of modernism, the Roman Catholic Church. months in 1903-4, he invited Chesterton and other Several factors weighed in Chesterton’s decision to Christians to defend their beliefs in weekly columns. become a Catholic. Frances and his family opposed Chesterton’s three contributions argued that the the move. Many people in England still saw Catholi- Christian worldview was much more rational than cism as the mysterious, foreign, and despotic religion anything so-called rationalists had proposed. that had provoked so much pain during the Refor- Chesterton lodged additional complaints against mation. On the other side, Chesterton’s brother Cecil the day’s leading thinkers in his regular columns for showed interest in Catholicism, and Chesterton had London’s Daily News and in the 1905 book Heretics. developed immense respect for a Catholic priest, John These writings attracted the interest of Christians O’Connor, who would later become the inspiration and critics alike, but they raised more questions than for Chesterton’s fictional sleuth Father Brown. A trip they answered. One critical reviewer announced, “I to Italy, which included Easter morning worship at a shall not begin to worry about my philosophy of life Catholic church in Brindisi, tipped the balance. Ches- until Mr. Chesterton discloses his.” Chesterton re- terton joined the Roman Catholic Church in 1922 and sponded in 1908 with his celebrated book Ortho- was overjoyed when Frances joined, too, in 1926. doxy, which he called “unavoidably affirmative and therefore unavoidably autobiographical.” A Sharp Pen Orthodoxy traced the author’s descent into de- Chesterton never assumed the quiet life of a writer. spair, recovery of wonder through literature (espe- He lectured and participated in public debates. He cially children’s fantasy literature), and eventual traveled. He threw wild parties at which guests had discovery that every “new” truth he encountered to don costumes and act out sketches. He even ap- had in fact been taught by Christianity for centuries. peared, along with George Bernard Shaw and other Chesterton laid special emphasis on the paradoxes literary figures, in a western film made during of Christianity, those teachings that seem foolish or World War I by Peter Pan author J.M. Barrie. None- self-contradictory on the surface but resonate deeply theless, it is for his many published pieces that he is with what the soul knows to be true. For example, chiefly remembered. while ancient pagans and modern rationalists de- The Father Brown mysteries are among fined modesty as “the balance between mere pride Chesterton’s most treasured works. They follow the and mere prostration,” Christianity insisted that whodunit format established by Sherlock Holmes people embrace both extremes: “In so far as I am creator Arthur Conan Doyle, but Chesterton added Man I am the chief of creatures. In so far as I am a spiritual depth. Like Holmes, Brown keenly observes man I am the chief of sinners.” Similarly, pagans crime scene details and human behavior, but he also and rationalists practiced charity as reasonable diagnoses the heresies that drive people to sin. The goodwill toward reasonably deserving debtors. Ac- Father Brown collection includes 51 tales that are cording to these schools of thought, “there were considered by mystery enthusiasts to be some of the Profiles in Faith—G.K. Chesterton 3 best examples of the genre. Chesterton’s rules for Shakespeare will not startle you with any more. But mystery writing, including transparency regarding imagine what it would be to live with such men still clues and a solution simple enough to be shouted in living, to know that Plato might break out with an one sentence, were codified by London’s Detection original lecture tomorrow, or that at any moment Club, an elite group that claimed Dorothy Sayers Shakespeare might shatter everything with a single and Agatha Christie as members.
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