We Are All Actors in a Terrific Drama Which Heaven Has Given Us to Play Upon This Earth” —G.K

14 Tremendous Trifles 2 Rolling Road de la Lastra Visiting the Vertical and the Horizontal 14 9 & 26 2 26 on GKC

“We are all actors in a terrific drama which Heaven has given us to play upon this earth” —G.K. CHESTERTON

. VOL . NO.

21 04 $ 00 7 MARCH/APRIL 2018 CONNECTINGCONNECTING Science,Science, FaithFaith && ReasonReason ◆ FIVE PROOFS OF THE EXISTENCE OF GOD — Edward Feser detailed, updated exposition and defense of five of the historically most important, but in recent years largely neglected, philosophical proofs of God’s existence: the Aristotelian, the ANeo-Platonic, the Augustinian, the Thomistic, and the Rationalist. It also offers a thorough treatment of each of the key divine attributes, showing that they must be possessed by the God whose existence is demonstrated by the proofs. Finally, it answers all of the objections that have been leveled against these proofs, providing the most complete defense of traditional natural theology in print. FPEGP . . . Sewn Softcover, $19.95 “A watershed book. Feser has completely severed the intellectual legs upon which modern atheism had hoped to stand.” — Matthew Levering, Ph.D., Chair of Theology, Mundelein Seminary ◆ THE IMMORTAL IN YOU How Human Nature is More an Science Can Say — Michael Augros any scientists and philosophers believe that we are no more than a machine. ere is no a erlife and our existence is purely the outcome of chance events. e core of this belief is Ma philosophical assumption that modern science tells all there is to know about us and the world. With cogency and clarity, Augros exposes that assumption to the light and demolishes it. He shows how an astute use of common sense and our common human experience reveal there is much more to us than science could possibly say. IIYP . . . Sewn Softcover, $18.95 “Far and away the best book I have ever read about the nature of mankind. On a scale of 1 to 10, I have to give it a 12.” — Peter Kreeft, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, Boston College ◆ GALILEO REVISITED — Dom Paschal Scotti alileo is the name o en invoked by those who say science and religion are in opposition. But is that really the lesson to be drawn from the life of Galileo? No other work has brought together Gsuch a complete description of the historical context of the controversies surrounding Galileo in its political, cultural, philosophical, religious, scienti c and personal aspects like this volume. In addition to covering the whole of Galileo’s life, as well as his condemnation by the Inquisition in 1633, this book also includes a full historical discussion of the relationship between religion and science. GAREP . . . Sewn Softcover, $18.95 “Prof. Scotti’s richly detailed book brings that vibrant world to life and helps us to understand those fateful events as they happened and were understood at the time by those who took part.” — Stephen Barr, Ph.D., Professor of Physics, University of Delaware ◆ THE CASE FOR CATHOLICISM — Trent Horn he most up-to-date, comprehensive, and thorough defense of the Catholic Church against Protestant objections in print, especially relevant for the 500th anniversary of the Protestant TReformation. It answers arguments put forward by early Reformers as well as contemporary defenders of Protestantism. It provides a meticulous defense of the biblical and historical nature of Catholic doctrines from Scripture and church history. In answering Protestant objections to Catholicism and in providing evidence for the Faith, it cites modern Protestant scholars who question Reformation assumptions and show how evidence from Scripture and church history support aspects of Catholic theology. CCATP . . . Sewn Softcover, $19.95 “Trent Horn offers clear and convincing answers to some of the most common Protestant objections to the Catholic faith.” —Francis Beckwith, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, Baylor University www.ignatius.com

P.O. Box 1339, Ft. Collins, CO 80522 (800) 651-1531 TABLE OF CONTENTS CONNECTINGCONNECTING Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 ...... TREMENDOUS TRIFLES 2 CHESTERTON’S MAIL BAG 31 ALL I SURVEY 21 A New Batch of Letters Asking Name the Date “What’s the Difference?” BY DAVID FAGERBERG Science,Science, FaithFaith && ReasonReason FEATURES BY G.K. CHESTERTON CHESTERTON UNIVERSITY ...... 22 ◆ ...... FIVE PROOFS OF THE EXISTENCE OF GOD — Edward Feser MEDITATION 3 LETTER TO AMERICA...... 32 A Primer in Paradox detailed, updated exposition and defense of five of the historically most important, but Night And Day Morticians and Moralists NEWS WITH VIEWS ...... 26 A in recent years largely neglected, philosophical proofs of God’s existence: the Aristotelian, the BY G.K. CHESTERTON Neo-Platonic, the Augustinian, the Thomistic, and the Rationalist. It also offers a thorough STRAWS IN THE WIND...... 4 treatment of each of the key divine attributes, showing that they must be possessed by the God Seven Days’ Hard CHESTERTON’S SKETCHBOOK. . . . . 32 BOOK REVIEWS whose existence is demonstrated by the proofs. Finally, it answers all of the objections that have BY G.K. CHESTERTON been leveled against these proofs, providing the most complete defense of traditional natural ALL IS GRIST Seeing Things as They Are: theology in print. LETTERS FROM READERS...... 5 G .K . Chesterton and A Going Concern...... 14 the Drama of Meaning ...... 24 FPEGP . . . Sewn Softcover, $19.95 BY JOE CAMPBELL TRUTH IN THE STATE REVIEWED BY DALE AHLQUIST “A watershed book. Feser has completely severed the intellectual legs upon which modern atheism OF TRANSMISSION ...... 6 had hoped to stand.” — Matthew Levering, Ph.D., Chair of Theology, Mundelein Seminary The Problem With The Play’s the Thing Thursday ...... 25 Us Chestertonians...... 15 ◆ THE IMMORTAL IN YOU BY DALE AHLQUIST REVIEWED BY DAVID DEAVEL How Human Nature is More an Science Can Say — Michael Augros BY DAVID MILLS COVER PHOTO: Chesterton Academy juniors, any scientists and philosophers believe that we are no more than a machine. ere is no MISCELLANY OF MEN...... 8 Olivia Heimel and Clare Karels in a scene a erlife and our existence is purely the outcome of chance events. e core of this belief is Uproariously Encouraging Pessimism COLUMNS from The Lily of Palestine. Ma philosophical assumption that modern science tells all there is to know about us and the world. BY DALE AHLQUIST SCHALL ON CHESTERTON ...... 10 With cogency and clarity, Augros exposes that assumption to the light and demolishes it. He shows how an astute use of common sense and our common human experience reveal there is much more ROLLING ROAD...... 12 On Going To Canterbury JAMES V. SCHALL, S, J. to us than science could possibly say. Visiting the Vertical and IIYP . . . Sewn Softcover, $18.95 the Horizontal CHESTERTON’S GREAT BY DALE AHLQUIST “Far and away the best book I have ever read about the nature of mankind. On a scale of 1 to 10, I have to give it a 12.” CHARACTERS...... 18 — Peter Kreeft, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, Boston College Edward Nutt THE SIGNATURE OF MAN...... 27 ◆ Dom Paschal Scotti BY CHRIS CHAN GALILEO REVISITED — Architecture in Search of Style alileo is the name o en invoked by those who say science and religion are in opposition. But is BY G.K. CHESTERTON THE FLYING INN...... 19 Gthat really the lesson to be drawn from the life of Galileo? No other work has brought together Environmentalism such a complete description of the historical context of the controversies surrounding Galileo in THE DISTRIBUTIST ...... 29 DAVID BERESFORD its political, cultural, philosophical, religious, scienti c and personal aspects like this volume. In The Great Disease VARIED TYPES...... 20 addition to covering the whole of Galileo’s life, as well as his condemnation by the Inquisition in BY G.K. CHESTERTON 1633, this book also includes a full historical discussion of the relationship between religion Passing the Torch BY VICTORIA DARKEY and science. GAREP . . . Sewn Softcover, $18.95 “Prof. Scotti’s richly detailed book brings that vibrant world to life and helps us to understand those fateful events as they happened and were understood at the time by those who took part.” — Stephen Barr, Ph.D., Professor of Physics, University of Delaware PHOTO CREDITS: Cover: 6-7: Phil Leisenheimer; p.2: Stuart McCullough; p. 12, 13, 27: Dale Ahlquist; p. 19: David Beresford ◆ THE CASE FOR CATHOLICISM — Trent Horn Illustrations, p 9 and 26: Virginia de la Lastra he most up-to-date, comprehensive, and thorough defense of the Catholic Church against TProtestant objections in print, especially relevant for the 500th anniversary of the Protestant All other images to the best of our knowledge are in the public domain. Reformation. It answers arguments put forward by early Reformers as well as contemporary PUBLISHER and EDITOR: Dale Ahlquist, President, ACS ART DIRECTOR: Ted Schluenderfritz MEMBERSHIP DIRECTOR: Linda Phillips SENIOR WRITER: Art defenders of Protestantism. It provides a meticulous defense of the biblical and historical nature Livingston CONTRIBUTING EDITORS: David Beresford, Joe Campbell, John C. Chalberg, Christopher Chan, Victoria Darkey, David Paul Deavel, David of Catholic doctrines from Scripture and church history. In answering Protestant objections W. Fagerberg, Mark Pilon, James V. Schall SJ SUBSCRIPTIONS & RENEWALS: (See form p. 29) CREDIT CARD ORDERS: call 1-800-343-2425 or fax 1-952-831- to Catholicism and in providing evidence for the Faith, it cites modern Protestant scholars who 0387 E-MAIL: [email protected] LETTERS AND ARTICLES: [email protected]; Letters to the editor may be edited for length or clarity. question Reformation assumptions and show how evidence from Scripture and church history support aspects of Catholic theology. Gilbert! Magazine is published every eight weeks by The American Chesterton Society, a non-profit corporation established under Paragraph 501(c)(3) of the U.S. Tax Code. Donations to the American Chesterton Society are tax-deductible in the United States. Your contributions help support the publication of Gilbert CCATP . . . Sewn Softcover, $19.95 Magazine. Please send your donations to: The American Chesterton Society, 4117 Pebblebrook Circle, Minneapolis, MN 55437. The views expressed by Gilbert “Trent Horn offers clear and convincing answers to some of the most common Protestant objections Magazine contributors are not necessarily those of the publisher, the editors, or the American Chesterton Society. to the Catholic faith.” —Francis Beckwith, Ph.D., Professor of Philosophy, Baylor University Copyright ©2018 by The American Chesterton Society. www.ignatius.com Donate to the American Chesterton Society • www.chesterton.org P.O. Box 1339, Ft. Collins, CO 80522 (800) 651-1531

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 1 TREMENDOUS TRIFLES by Dale Ahlquist nited States Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch— who was recently appointed to the Supreme Just a few months after the Bolshevik Court and is in his first term as a justice—refer- 100 Revolution, G.K. Chesterton called Lenin enced G.K. Chesterton in a Supreme Court judi- YEARS AGO to task for the logical inconsistencies cial opinion issued on January 22, 2018. In a dis- uttered in a recent speech. Lenin had senting opinion in Artis v. District of Columbia referred to the “ignorant peasantry” of Russia who, as (a case about state statutes of limitations), Justice Chesterton says “are, of course, the great majority of Gorsuch bookended his dissent with an allusion to Chesterton’s Russia—have even now no comprehension of what U has occurred.” He quotes Lenin as saying that new famous fence: Chesterton reminds us not to clear away a fence just be- revolutionary ideas “will ripen in the mind of the mass- cause we cannot see its point. Even if a fence doesn’t seem to es.” GKC’s comment: “Now it is surely obvious, on a have a reason, sometimes all that means is we need to look revolutionary and not a conservative assumption, that more carefully for the reason it was built in the first place…. revolutionary ideas ought to be tolerably ripe before The Court today clears away a fence that one marked a basic they produce a revolution. It is absurd, upon any argu- boundary between federal and state power. Maybe it wasn’t the ment, to make the disturbance first and the discontent most vital fence and maybe we’ve just simply forgotten why afterwards. It is absurd, I say, upon any argument; this particular fence was built in the first place. But maybe, too, and it is trebly absurd upon a democratic argument. By whose authority were the Bolsheviks first rioting and then ruling, first making war, then making peace, and then wanting to make war again? If they were not acting in the name of the masses, in whose name in heaven or earth were they acting? They had no right to ask us even to excuse their success, if they had not already converted the common citizens. And now they claim the right to ask us to excuse their failure, merely because they had not converted them.”

we’ve forgotten because we’ve wandered so far from the idea of a federal government of limited and enumerated powers that we’ve begun to lose sight of what it looked like in the first place. This prompted ACS member Luke Reilander to check if the U.S. Supreme Court had ever cited Chesterton before, and it appears from his search that this has happened only one other time. In a 1995 case, Qualitex Co. v. Jacobson Prod. Co., 514 U.S. 159, Justice Stephen Breyer—who is still active on the Court today—quoted Chesterton in a case considering whether color can be a trademark: The upshot is that, where a color serves a significant nontrade- mark function—whether to distinguish a heart pill from a diges- tive medicine or to satisfy the ‘noble instinct for giving the right touch of beauty to common and necessary things’ G. Chesterton, Simplicity and Tolstoy 61 (1912) . . . . Chesterton’s “noble instinct” quote is from an essay called “William Morris and His School” in the 1912 essay collection, Simplicity and Tolstoy, which was a reprint of essays from Twelve Types (1903).

• In February, The Oxford Troubadours staged a production of Chesterton’s• play The Surprise at Oxford. Stuart McCullough, Gilbert! meets Gilbert. who runs the Catholic Chesterton Society in London, took

2 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 TREMENDOUS TRIFLES MEDITATION his family to the play, and on the way they stopped in Beaconsfield, where they visited Chesterton’s grave. There son Nathanael brought the latest issue of Gilbert! to the Night And Day graveside. The amazing ten-year-old man- lmighty God has given us, for the ordering of our lives, an alterna- aged to find a typo in the magazine. tion of day and night. “Each day echoes its secret to the next, each night passes on to the next its revelation of knowledge.” [Psalm 18:2 • Allacin Morimizu has an ongoing fea- Knox Translation] The day by its brightness typifies his glory, the ture• on her blog called “What is Truly might by its darkness recall to us the profundity of his mysterious Worth Knowing.” She let us know that she being. And each day, as it were, waves is greeting to the last, bids has put together “The Gospel According to up pick up our interrupted works, renew our plans, our hope, our Father Brown—ALL the Detective Stories Aanxieties. Man goes forth to his work and to his labour until the evening; then Summarized and Illustrated.” night comes, and with a kindly smile bids us put away all the toys we poor mor- Although “all” is not quite accu- tals make such a fuss over; shuts our books for us, hides our distractions from us, draws a great black coverlet over our lives. And so our life is marked out for rate—she’s missing two uncollected sto- us by alternations; each day is separated from the rest by a thick black line of ries (“The Donnington Affair” and “The oblivion. Oh, we take up the burden of living where we left off, the griefs, the Mask of Midas”), she’s done a lot of work anxieties of yesterday return with the cold light of morning, and dissipate the and found some interesting historical dreams which served for anodyne. Still, it is something to have escaped their and original illustrations. Check it out at influence only for a few hours,; we have gained some strength for the morrow. allacin.blogspot.com. And meanwhile, alternation of day and night has served another purpose; its stands to us for a model and a sacrament of human life in general. As the dark- • What do you make of this from the ness closes round us, we go through a dress rehearsal of death; soul and body Anglican• Communion? say good-night to one another; the the soul wanders off into that unreal country where it can neither sin nor merit, can neither miss nor grasp opportunities. ATTENTION PASTORS And then morning comes, and with morning, a re-birth. AND PARENTS Each day, then, begins with a birth and ends in a death; each day is a life in miniature. And the very conditions of our existence take away from us that ex- There is a new fad going around with chil- cuse which is man’s favourite excuse when he wants to shirk action and to ne- dren called G.K. Chesterton. This is [a] glect his salvation—that we do not know when to start. “Each day echoes its se- highly addictive reading trend that is be- cret to the next”; yesterday whispers a word to today, and the word is, Begin. For ing passed around in books on the inter- today is unique; it has never happened before, it can never happen again. For one net through social media. moment it is all-important, fills the stage; tomorrow it will have taken its place Many kids are introduced to “G.K. among the unreal pageant of dead yesterdays. It has an importance, then, which Chesterton” or “Chestertoning” by the is all its own; but this importance only belongs to it because is it one of a series. seemingly harmless C.S. Lewis or Tolkien, It may be the first of a seies, the beginning of new life. It may stand in the middle of series, taking its colour from its fellows. And it may be the end of a series; but which are actually proven gateways. it may be our last day on earth. (Ronald Knox, “To-Day,” A Retreat for Lay People) It has been proven that kids who use C.S. Lewis are 85% more likely to move to use of G.K.Chesterton. Look for use in your chil- There is no life without the resurrection of the dead. Every evening a man dren! Watch for “warning words” like: dies like Hector and every morning he returns like Ulysses. (New Witness, “Orthodoxy” “Tolkien” Sept. 14, 1916) “Paradox” “Ordinariate” “Newman” “Walshingham” People wonder why the novel is the most popular form of literature; people This is really happening!!! Please wonder why it is read more than books of science or books of metaphysics. share this letter and watch for The reason is very simple; it is merely that the novel is more true than they are. the warning signs!!! Life may sometimes legitimately appear as a book of science. Life may sometimes appear, and with a much greater legitimacy, as a book of metaphysics. • A letter from Central Europe addressed But life is always a novel. Our existence may cease to be a song; it may cease only:• “Mr . G .K . Chesterton . England’s even to be a beautiful lament. Our existence may not be an intelligible justice, Greatest Writer . England” . was successfully or even a recognizable wrong. But our existence is still a story. In the fiery al- (“On Certain delivered to GKC in January, 1925. phabet of every sunset is written, “to be continued in our next.” Modern Writers and the Institution of the Family,” Heretics)

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 3 STRAWS IN THE WIND root in minus six. But I am not at all in- An Essay by G K. . Chesterton sisting on any literal six days; it is not required by my own creed. I am talking about the very grand ideas suggested by that symbol; of the creative power being for six days creative and for the sev- enth contemplative. For the true end of all creation is completion; and the true end of all completion is contemplation. Seven Days’ Hard Heaven forbid that, in the present un- By G.K. Chesterton enlightened state of the world, I should talk theology. But why have modern men got no sense even of the majesty of my- ou will all be struck by my manly murder in real life; but a sneak- thology? Let us regard the Genesis story remarkable resemblance to ish, evasive, make-believe murder, only as a myth; but let us treat it as educated the Devil; having only fif- meant for a murder story in a magazine. people do treat any other myth. When teen minutes in which to talk But on the whole, I think any such diary we read that Prometheus the Titan stole about seven days; and having of my days would be very dull to read and fire from heaven for mankind, we do not great wrath because my time to write; which is probably why I never say a giant was a thief who stole Jupiter’s Yis short. It is obvious that this survey of write it. match-box on Mount Olympus. When a week might be made in several ways; Now I would ask your attention to the we read that the whole world went into a and especially in two ways. I might make third aspect of the thing; which has noth- winter of lamentation because the Earth it what is called a survey of public events, ing to do with the loud triviality that we Goddess had lost her daughter, we do which means a survey of the very few im- call public life, or the loose triviality that not say that those superstitious Greeks portant events that are made public. In we now generally mean by private life. It thought an old witch could wither the other words, I could tell you all that you is not concerned with public life or pri- corn. We have some sense of the gran- have already read in the newspapers; for vate life, but with Life. And it seems to deur of these great natural allegories; and some of the least important social events me that Life is the one thing that most why have we no sense of the grandeur of are still allowed to appear in the news- modern men never think about all their that conception, by which a week have papers. But it would be much better fun lives. We are asked to consider what has become a wonderful and mystical thing, to tell you the things that do not ap- happened in seven days. Some of the in which Man imitates God in his labour pear in the newspapers. In that respect most aged among you were told, a long and in his rest? France is more fortunate than England; while ago, that the world was made in six I want to put to you, what is hard- we have had plenty of politicians whose days. Most of you are now told that mod- est of all to put in words; something that names have been linked with financiers ern science contradicts this; a statement is more private than private life. It is the like Stavisky, but we were never told which is certainly much more of a life fact that we are alive; and that life is far much about them, except their affection than the statement it contradicts. It also more astonishing than anything that we for goldfish or their interest in breeding shows that what these people call their enjoy or suffer in life. What has really squirrels. It is a strange society; if private modern science is not very modern. The happened during the last seven days and affairs are made public, it is only fair to ancient science, the Victorian science of nights? Seven times we have been dis- say that public affairs are kept quite pri- the days of Darwin, did indeed enter- solved into darkness as we shall be dis- vate. As it is, I could only tell you what tain a queer idea that anything was cred- solved into dust; our very selves, so far you have read and forgotten; and the only ible so long as it came very slowly. As if as we know, have been wiped out of the other obvious thing would be to describe we were to say we could believe in a hip- world of living things; and seven times what I myself have done during the week, pogryph if a horse only grew one feath- we have been raised alive like Lazarus, which I have forgotten myself. Some er at a time; or in a unicorn, if its horn and found all our limbs and senses un- vague memories remain, which might was not too rapidly exalted, but began as altered, with the coming of the day. That be made to sound vivid by unscrupu- a little knob like a pimple. But that is not one simple fact of Sleep is an almost per- lous selection. For instance, it would be modern science, whatever else it is. The fect example of the sort of thing I mean. perfectly true to say that I spent most of real modern science, the new science, for It is far more sensational than any fact or last Sunday, after going to Mass, in mak- what that is worth, tends more and more falsehood that can be read in the news- ing practical plans and arrangements for to an idea of mystical mathematical de- papers. It is far more sensational than a murder. Indeed, it was a double mur- sign, which may well be outside time. any scandalous secret I might reveal to der, and as both the murdered men were So far as the latest science goes, the cos- your delighted ears about my own pri- millionaires, I deeply grieve to announce mos might have appeared in six days; or vate life. If you want important events, that the plan was not actually carried into in six seconds; or more probably in mi- such as journalism is supposed to report, practice. But then it was not an honest nus six seconds; or perhaps in the square those are the important events. If you

4 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 STRAWS IN THE WIND LETTERS FROM READERS want the latest news, the latest news they would be six miles from a cin- is that I died last night; and that I was ema. It is perhaps true; and another miraculously reborn this morning, to way of putting the same truth is that your no small annoyance; for I fear modern men have utterly lost the joy that my return from the dead, though of life. They have to put up with the it is certainly news, is not necessar- miserable substitute of the joys of life. y name is Br. Gilbert Heater ily good news. But what weeks and And even these they seem less and less and I’m a novice at St. Vincent dates and Sundays and Sabbaths, and able to enjoy. Unless we can make or- Archabbey in Latrobe, PA. I was ancient ritual recurrences, are meant dinary men interested in ordinary life, M told that you were told about to remind us of, is exactly this enor- we are under the vulgar despotism of me...Regardless, I thought I should write mous importance of daily life, as it is those who cannot interest them, but to you not only to give you a greater ap- lived by every human being; as it is can at least amuse them. Unless we preciation for people who don’t impose related to death and daylight and all can make daybreak and daily bread on you, but to introduce myself proper- the mysterious lot of Man. To tell you and the creative secrets of labour in- ly in the hopes that I can be of service in that I have performed this or that sil- teresting in themselves, there will fall the future. ly action, such as making a speech like on all our civilisation a fatigue, which I did indeed take my monastic name this, might gratify my vanity. To tell is the one disease from which civilisa- after GKC. I was raised Protestant and the you that the leading public men who tions do not recover. So died the great works of Chesterton played a large part control our destinies have performed Pagan civilisation; of bread an circus- in my conversion to Catholicism. Many this or that silly action might grati- es and forgetfulness of the household paarts of Protestantism didn’t hold up for fy my irritation. But neither has very gods. me, but I have always had a deep devotion much to do with my life; and neither So, whatever you do, do not jeer to truth and reason, and the arguments in has anything to do with that great re- at the Book of Genesis. It would be Orthodoxy were a tremendous influence. volving wheel of cosmic light and better for you, it would be better for The sheer beauty and wonder in The Man darkness that we call a week. all of us, if we were so absolutely Who Was Thursdayand Manalive also And now you will naturally say bound by the Book of Genesis that the changed how I viewed the world. that all this is extremely vague and whole week was a series of symbol- Suffice to say, I’ve been initiated into transcendental and unpractical. I an- ic services, reminding us of the stages the Catholic Church and have been foll- swer, with some violence, that it is at of Creation. It would be better if ev- wing my calling as a Benedictine monk. I this moment by far the most practical ery Monday, instead of being Black am a great reader of Chesterton and look problem in the world. Unless we can Monday, were always Bright Monday, forward to my copy of Gilbert! with great bring men back to enjoying the dai- to commemorate the creation of the anticipation. It is a fantastic publication, ly life, which moderns call a dull life, Light. It would be better if Tuesday, at and I thank you for all your effort and our whole civilisation will be in ruins present a word of somewhat colour- dedication. It is needed and appreciated. in about fifteen years. Whenever any- less connotation, represented a great Br. Gilbert body proposes anything really practi- feast of fountains and rivers and roll- Latrobe, PA cal, to solve the economic evil today, ing streams; because it was the day of the answer always is that the solution the Division of the Waters. It would would not work, because the mod- be better if every Wednesday were an ern town populations would think occasion for the hanging the house nother very good issue of Gilbert! I life dull. That is because they are en- with green boughs or blossoms; be- did not know that David Beresford tirely unacquainted with life. They cause these things were brought forth has the high honour of being know nothing but distractions from on the third day of Creation: or that A able to claim descent from the life; dreams, which may be found in Thursday were sacred to the sun and Manchester area. My congratulations! I the cinema; that is, brief oblivions moon, and Friday sacred to the fish was born in Church Street, Harpurhey, a of life. I am not going to talk about and fowl; and so on. Then you might couple of miles north of the city centre. the advantages of this or that social begin to have some notion of the im- The authorities have since demolished solution; but it is true that this is the portance of a week; and what a high that area. When I was somewhat older standing difficulty of all social solu- imaginative civilisation might really our family moved to the slightly more tions. Some people, like the late Mr. do with a week. If it had the creative elevated district in south Manchester, Galsworthy, think that the English power to produce such a pageant of Chorlton-cum-Hardy. The authori- poor should be helped further to col- creation, it would not bother about ties have since changed the name of the onise the Colonies. Some, of whom cinemas. road... Does David have any detail of his I am one, have even dared to dream From a BBC Radio Broadcast, published in area? that the English might be allowed to The Listener, January 31, 1934. Aidan Mackey colonise England. But to both the ob- Oxford, England jection is always essentially this: that

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 5 TRUTH IN THE STATE OF TRANSMISSION students gain self-confidence, the abili- ty to speak in public, and they explore motivation and emotion. It’s all about the The Play’s the Thing word becoming flesh. Makes perfect sense. Makes you won- By Dale Ahlquist der why every school doesn’t require drama. Especially every Catholic school. s if there isn’t enough inciden- on stage. For some this is easy, for oth- Well, there’s one problem. Where do tal drama in trying to run a ers, drama is a trauma. For everyone, it you get good plays to put on? Especially school where almost every- is a great experience. My wife, who runs for high schoolers. Contemporary dra- thing you teach is opposed by the theater department, says that drama offers only the contemptible, where the rest of the world, we also ma is the most Christian of all the arts. It the glory of the spoken word has been require drama at Chesterton means dying to yourself and coming to replaced by the open sewer of foul lan- AAcademy. Three years of it. The sopho- life as a creature that a creator meant you guage. Back up a bit in history and we mores are introduced to the stage by per- to be. It means getting outside of your- have the trite and the sprite, which prob- forming in a comedy, usually a murder self, a step of faith. It means cooperating ably helped provoke the edgy, angry, mystery. It’s a good way to teach sacrifice with others in a common work, as in the and obscene that followed. Back up fur- when somebody has to die. Junior year, body of Christ, where every part is im- ther, and you have Shaw, who, what he we put them through the rigors of an in- portant, and if one part, even small, does lacked in depth, made up for in length. tense religious drama, usually a story not function well, the whole body suffers. Before that is Ibsen, Scandinavia’s gift to about a saint. Conveniently, every saint She also argues that drama is among the Depression. Go back some more, and had a dramatic life. And senior year, it’s most complete of the arts, for it involves you have melodrama, which certainly is Shakespeare. visual and aural, music and movement, sensational, moral, and, well, melodra- By making drama a required course, color and balance, understanding liter- matic, but can’t be taken seriously, even it means that every student has to get up ature and analysis of a text. Besides, the as comedy.

A scene from The Lily of Palestine, the Junior class play at Chesterton Academy.

6 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 Truth in the State of Transmission

I left out the experimental, the ab- words, the playwrights simply did not Bodies Please, where corpses keep turn- surd, and the ponderous (Beckitt, have high school drama classes in mind ing up at a hotel, Mind Over Murder, Ionesco, O’Neill). I left out the Russians when they wrote these plays, even if they where a psychiatrist does his best to be because that cherry orchard has been were masterpieces. no help to his screwed up patients and pretty well picked over. The solution? Simple. We write our finds himself quite shot by the end of What about classical drama? As in own plays. We make sure everybody has the first act, and Unconventional, where Sophocles and Aristophanes? We are, af- a part, that the parts are well-distribut- the entire theater becomes a convention ter all, a classical school. Well, my wife ed, that the material has some substance, hall filled with the wrong people at the refuses to direct these because the com- some point, some dramatic unity and op- wrong time wanting the wrong things. edies are too bawdy even for the jaded, portunity, and some appeal to the audi- For our dramas, we’ve presented the sto- and the dramas are too boring even for ence. Plenty of laughs for the sophomore ries St. Francis of Assisi, St. Catherine of the most studious. She recruited anoth- play, plenty of tears and tension for the Genoa, and the little known St. Mariam er teacher direct a version of The Trojan juniors. When you’re writing a play with Baouardy. We’ve also staged Robert Women and we decided we will do an- a specific purpose, one that you know Hugh Benson’s compelling Come Rack! other classical play in about ten years, will be performed, and by performers Come Rope! The students love them, the which should leave only a few people whom you also know, you don’t worry audiences love them. We also did a play who will have remembered the first one. about expressing yourself. You only wor- called Nuns and Aliens. That got every- There are good plays, of course, even ry about expressing the truth. Then you one’s attention. if I can’t think of any at the moment, adorn it with people wearing costumes. When we get to Shakespeare, we but even these present an impossibili- And you want them to enjoy the words praise him for his plays, but we also lam- ty. They don’t have 20 roles, with 8 male you have put in their mouths. I write the baste him for his thoughtlessness in not parts and 12 female parts. And even if plays for the students, but also for the taking our high school classes into con- they do have larger casts, it means there audience. sideration when writing his scripts. So are some characters who 247 lines and Our murder mysteries have been we have to have some of the men’s roles others who have two. Or one. In other madcap, with such offerings asMore played by women, which can be confusing in some of his plays where women get dressed as men, and sisters as broth- ers, and so on. In Romeo and Juliet, we made artistic changes so that the Prince of Verona became the Princess of Verona, and Mrs. Montague was a single mom, and Brother Lawrence was Sister Lawrence. Only had to change a few pro- nouns, and somehow it all worked. All the Shakespeare came through just fine. And the point is the students are ready to perform Shakespeare after they’ve had two previous years on the stage, performing both comedy and drama. There is no question about the value of drama, but there is the problem that there are so many bad plays. The solution is good plays. If you can’t find a good play, write one. With drama, as with all the arts, we cannot afford to be passive and settle for what the world has been sloughing off on us. We have to reclaim the arts. Creativity is one of our God- like attributes. We can even be God-like in enjoying what we create. It’s an act of love. There is also the creative act that takes place between the actors and the audience which when the word becomes flesh. When it happens, it is a glorious experience. Divine. It is indeed, as my wife says, the most Christian of all the arts.

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 7 MISCELLANY OF MEN Patriots’ Club, which met at intervals “to consume roast beef and drink good ale” and whose object was to interest people in patriotism “by every recognised meth- Uproariously Encouraging od of agitation and advertisement.” Gilbert and Frances attended the wedding of Charles and Lucy Masterman Pessimism at Westminster Abbey in June of 1908. C.F.G. Masterman, (1873-1927) When the newlyweds greeted him in the nave, he said he wanted to present By Dale Ahlquist each of them with one of his books. He first asked for a pen, and on the spot, he wrote an original poem in each book, n 1907, when Charles Masterman A month later, Masterman wrote “An Imitation” in The Napoleon of Notting was editor of the newly formed lit- in his diary that he went to dinner at Hill (for him), and “A Ballade of Wedding erary magazine, The Albany Review Chesterton’s flat: Presents” in The Man Who was Thursday he asked G.K. Chesterton to con- (for her). A splendid evening. Gilbert in tremen- tribute a poem for the first issue. A graduate of Cambridge, Charles dous form, discoursing about A.J.B. Chesterton promised the poem, but Frederick Gurney Masterman, gravitat- (Arthur Balfour). “He hath a devil, I’m Ias the deadline approached, the poem ed from journalism to politics, and while sure of it, Charles, when you get up to did not. Masterman finally went person- Chesterton became alienated from the speak in answer to him, you ought to ally to Chesterton’s flat in Battersea to see Liberal party, Masterman got more in- make the sign of the Cross and say, ‘Leave if he could collect the poem. volved, first being elected to Parliament him and come out of him.’ He would van- He found GKC in bed. He was not ill. and then becoming a high level bureau- ish into smoke and the rest of the H[ouse] He “had merely been thinking of other crat under Lloyd George. Chesterton of C[ommons] would rush down a steep things and forgotten to get up.” He apol- said, “He became a politician from the place into the river.” All the evening after ogized for not sending the poem. It was noblest bitterness on behalf of the poor... dinner he recited poetry to us, Ballades of ready to go, but for the fact that he still he was a pessimistic official. He had had his own, Belloc’s, Bentley’s... had not written down. He would be hap- a dark Puritan upbringing and retained py to recite it, and Masterman could copy And yet, years later, when Masterman a sort of feeling of the perversity of the it. Easier said than done. There was a dis- reminded Chesterton about his recita- gods; he said to me, ‘I am the sort of man tinct shortage of writing paper in the flat. tions on those evenings, GKC answered who goes under a hedge to eat an apple.’ Frances Chesterton started tearing half- “in his delightful sing song drawl, ‘Ayee But he was also an organiser and liked sheets of letters, splitting open used en- have done many foolish things. But aye governing; only his pessimism made him velopes, and finding any other avail- have never read aloud my own poetry’.” think that government had always been able scrap of paper lying around, while Gilbert and “Charlie” were young bad, and was now no worse than usu- Masterman furiously took dictation from liberals together, and it was al. Therefore, to men on fire GKC, who, “lying back on his pillow, while out canvassing for reform, he came to poured out the first canto ofThe Ballad for their candidate seem an obstacle and of the White Horse.” that Masterman an official apologist; A year later, Masterman wrote to his worked one side but the last thing fiancee, Lucy Lyttleton, the grand niece of the street he really wanted of the legendary prime minister, William and Chesterton was to apologise Gladstone: the other, but for anything.” Charlie went Chesterton said Last night we had a great orgy... we had down his side that Masterman Belloc and Chesterton and Maurice and back up had “a luxuri- Baring and Mr. and Mrs. [Rann] Kennedy the other till he ant gloom” about ... We talked incessantly; we recited origi- found GKC still him, but that there nal ballads and poetry (at least I didn’t as I standing at the door was something hadn’t any) and... John Burns told stories of the first house ar- about his pessimism and Hilaire sang his own Sussex drink- guing with the resi- that was “uproariously ing songs. Then we all went off in cabs dent therein. “The purpose encouraging.” to Maurice Baring’s and we argued about of canvassing,” said Chesterton, “is Although many of Masterman’s religion and other subjects till about 2 conversion.” early friends drifted away from him, o’clock. And I walked home through the Their friendship dated back to 1904, Chesterton never did. And it was to silent streets. when they were fellow members of the Chesterton that Masterman went with

8 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 Miscellany of Men one of his most brilliant ideas during were in every way his inferiors,” he won his soul purified by fire, and startled by the Great War: the idea of enlisting the day and helped win the war because signs in heaven as much as any read- England’s greatest writers to write pam- “all that dark humour that was deepest in er in Babylon or Gomorrah.” But upon phlets, books and journalistic essays on him came out again, as he grinned over... this revelation Masterman would ex- behalf of the country, supporting the his success as an intellectual smuggler.” pect that average man to destroy the war, recruiting fighting men, and crit- When Masterman attempted to re- suburban villa and flee from it, where- icizing Prussia. So joining such lumi- turn as a candidate for Parliament, Lloyd as Chesterton would expect that the sa- naries as Arthur Conan Doyle, Thomas George did not support him, and he lost. cred shock would cause him to “kneel Hardy, H.G. Wells, James Barrie, John He switched to the Labour Party in the before his own home as before a tem- Galsworthy, Robert Hugh Benson, Israel following election, but he eventually re- ple,” kissing the doorsteps and hugging Zangwill, John Masefield, and Arnold turned to journalism, as editor of The the railings, to the misunderstanding of Bennett, was G.K. Chesterton. That’s Nation. the passing policeman. why there are all those essays about those He was, says Chesterton, “nearly as In other words, they agreed about rotten Prussians, and books like “The untidy as I was.” They enjoyed their ar- what was wrong with the world, even if Barbarism of Berlin.” guments. When they both wrote for the they did not agree about how to fix it. The propaganda effort was a great Daily News, in 1905, Chesterton said But it was the former agreement that success. Chesterton said that although they both agreed “that the average re- led Chesterton, in 1910, to dedicated his Masterman had “allowed himself to be spectable man inhabiting a modern vil- great book What’s Wrong with the World used as a Party hack by Party leaders who la in a modern suburb requires to have to C.F.G. Masterman.

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 9 SCHALL ON CHESTERTON time and place, to men and women of our kind who are like ourselves, howev- Timely Essays on Chesterton’s Timeless Paradoxes er much each of us has a different story. “Man lives by his devouring appetite for morality,” Chesterton observed. “The chivalric romance does really represent the Christian conception of life, which is at once a Quest, a Test, and Adventure.” Lacking any of these three ingredients On Going To Canterbury means that we do not live a fully human James V. Schall, S, J. life, a life that needs purpose, challenge, and the unknown to discover. Like C. S. Lewis, Thomas Howard, and many pas- I. he wrote, “who have not felt something of sages in scripture, the dance seems best he fifth chapter of Chesterton’s the pleasure of being able to lose them- to depict the adventure of putting order 1932 biography, Chaucer, is de- selves in the longest books of Dickens into our lives. voted to The Canterbury Tales or Trollope.” This reading experience re- Chesterton spells out the difference themselves. Chesterton calls quires leisure, a frame of mind that does between the medieval dance and that of this most famous medieval not let the busy world about us claim ev- modernity. “The Dance has turned into book the first modern “novel erything within us. We enjoy spending a Race. That is, the (modern) dancers ofT character”. It is the first one to com- time on the project of reading a long nov- lose their balance and only recover it by bine plot and story with the insides of el. “Chaucer and his friends were real- running toward some object, or alleged the persons whom we meet in the tale. ly capable of reacting to those surprises, object; not an object within their circle And we meet everyone, not just the he- of waiting patiently for the point of those or their possession, but an object which roes and the renowned, but also the nor- stories; of treating the whole narrative they do not as yet possess….” In these mal and insignificant folks who also have process as a pleasure in itself.” words, Chesterton points to the distinc- their stories. They too go to Canterbury, The wanting to see the whole of the tive difference between the modern and a place of witness and devotion for all. human adventure as it becomes mani- the classic dance. “One is rhythmic and Chesterton was impressed with a fest in each person is something innate to recurrent movement, because there is a world that had time to listen to long poetic us. Both for good and for ill, we want to known center, while the other is precip- sagas. “There are few cultivated moderns,” know what happened, in their respective itate or progressive movement, because

India ✦ ✦ I know very little about India; and if I were and golf clubs. (Introduction to Henri Massis, 1927) merely to make a private guess, it would be that ✦ ✦ The principal weakness of Indian Nationalism seems to be there is no such place. (G.K.’s Weekly, May 31, 1934) that it is not very Indian and not very national...there is a na- ✦ ✦ I recently received a pamphlet from an honest Indian gen- tional distinction between a people asking for its tleman who has a new religion that will establish own ancient life and a people asking for things universal peace. I confess that the impres- that have been wholly invented by some- sion produced on my mind by the excel- body else. (Illustrated London News, Oct. lent Hindu humanitarian was that he 2, 1909) [from the essay that inspired might very well unite all human beings, Gandhi] if only all human beings were Hindus. ✦ ✦ Mr. Gandhi is exhibited in all sorts (Illustrated London News, June 17, 1927) of aspects and attitudes; chiefly, in the ✦ ✦ Even we who call their country popular press, as a person who wears India, even those of us who have dealt spectacles and not much else. (New with it, traded with it, or sought to rule York American, Jan. 9, 1932) it, know not whether it be an empire, or ✦ ✦ We have come and we have con- a chaos, or a nation, or a theocratic asso- quered: but we have not seen. (Introduction ciation, or a secret society, or only a map. to Hinduism: the World-Ideal.1916) (Introduction to Hinduism: the World-Ideal.1916) ✦ ✦ It was perhaps too much to expect that we ✦ ✦ Nobody has set up anything like the Cathedral should ever really understand India. (Illustrated of Seville to face the Taj Mahal. We have set up only tents London News, April 25, 193)1

10 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 Schall on Chesterton there is an unknown goal. The latter has it was in 1930 when Chesterton consid- actually are and we can know them. produced what we call Progress; the for- ered Chaucer. The thirst for what is defines our be- mer what the medieval meant by Order; ing. This is what Chesterton saw when but it was the lively order of the Dance.” III. he considered the characters bound to- A dance is not a race, not something to gether not to go just anywhere, but to get over in world-record time. In a passage that reminds us of what he go somewhere, to Canterbury, to some- wrote in his book on Aquinas, speaking where where the divine had indicated its II. of what distinguishes men like Chaucer, presence. and yes, Aquinas, Chesterton wrote: “It is It is the religion of dogma, of facts, The unique characters who found them- gusto; it is zest; it is a certain appetite for that are allows us to be together in the selves on pilgrimage to the shrine of St. things as they actually are, and because same world, the world we look upon Thomas in Canterbury were not tourists. they actually are; for a stone because it with “gusto” and with “zest” because Nor were they modern individualist mys- is a stone, or a story because it is a story.” things actually “are”. Our pleasure con- tics seeking to find themselves. The pil- Human lives are best recorded as stories, sists in the astonishing fact that things, grims to Canterbury had a goal in their as accounts of how they freely live their including ourselves, stand outside of journey. Without this common under- lives. The story is as much a part of real- nothingness. Chesterton seems to con- standing of where they were going, there ity as the stone; indeed, more reality ex- clude that if there is no Canterbury to- would be “nothing to keep the Pilgrims on ists in a story than in any stone. wards which we direct our minds and the same Pilgrimage.” This observation is The “zest” for things as they “actu- steps, we can only run a race that leads mindful of the final scene in Belloc’s Four ally” are is rooted in the fact that they us to nowhere. Men, when the four companions finally end their journey through Sussex to return to their own homes. “A journey, if it CORNER is enjoyable on account of its object, is not equally enjoyable if it goes on for ever.” Celebrating Famous The Originator What enables men to be together & Infamous Names President Hoover are not “feelings” of good will, but facts, with E.C. Bentley’s Elusive Felt in need of a soother truths. “The broad religion creates the After his little tiff narrow clique. It is what is called the reli- CLERIHEW Light Verse Form With Governor Al Smith gion of dogma, that is of facts (or alleged facts), that creates broader brotherhood The Imitators: 7th and 8th graders from and brings men of all kinds together…. St. John Bosco School in Rochester, NY All men share in a fact, if they believe it to be a fact. Only a few men commonly Donald Trump Stephen Hake share a feeling, when it is only a feeling.” got a bump Wrote Saxon Math while eating steak. We cannot argue about “feelings”. But we from playing badminton Those hard questions make you rage can and must base ourselves on facts that with Hillary Clinton. which leaves you tearing out page we know to be true. —CATHERINE REGGIO, MARY KATHRYN after page. “All modern critics can take pleasure SHEBA, and SOPHIA MCMULLEN —GABRIEL CALCAGNO and JOEY LEE in the almost modern realism of the por- The writer Edgar Allan Poe traiture (of the pilgrims), in the variety Miley Cyrus liked to scare you so. of types and the vigor of their quarrels. had some sort of virus. His stories would make you cry, But the modern problem is more and Her career started to fall and sometimes the characters more the problem of keeping the com- when she sang “Wrecking Ball.” would die. —SOLAS CADY pany together at all; and the company —MATTHEW DENNINGER and PHILLIP SAVKA was kept together because it was going Winnie the Pooh to Canterbury.” They were walking and Captain Jack Sparrow had nothing to do, riding their mules to Canterbury because did not carry an arrow. so he rubbed his tummy of what happened there, because it was a He was a punk thinking of hunny. holy place that transcended the ordinary who spent his days drunk. —RONAN MAIER and EZRA MCMULLEN —MIA CLEVELAND and ANNA FLUGEL places in which they lived. “It is very puz- zling to look at the real society around CLERIHEW: A humorous, unmetrical, biographical verse of four short lines—two closed us at this moment, and consider wheth- couplets—with the first rhyme a play on the name of the subject. Readers are invited to er it has a purpose. For the present, at submit clerihews for “The Clerihew Corner,” with the understanding that submissions least, there is no Canterbury in sight for cannot be acknowledged or returned, nor will all be published. the Canterbury pilgrims.” If anything, a Canterbury is less visible in our time than

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 11 ROLLING ROAD Know Who. The gathering including a goodly collection of other converts besides Zubair and me. There was Condy Eckerle who read St . Thomas Aquinas, and found that he wanted to return to the Church in which he was baptized. And there was Willie Snow, a former nothing, Visiting the Vertical who, like me, started with The Everlasting Man. Now he’s in seminary. We all en- and the Horizontal joyed a rousing discussion that covered most things. I had such a good time that By Dale Ahlquist I forgot I was in New York. But then I was reminded where I hen you think of Man- I had the privilege of joining them as was when I walked outside. I had to hattan, you don’t think of their guest in January. And I brought step around the garbage bags lining Kansas. When you think a guest of my own: Zubair Simonson, the streets, and the folks with shopping of Madison, Minneapolis, a former Muslim, who had converted carts, sifting through the garbage, and Washington, and Arkan- to Catholicism because of reading You the cars honking at empty cars in front sas City, you don’t think Wof Kansas, and yet those are all cities in Kansas. I recently visited Manhattan. The one in New York. The one where even the small buildings are tall, where walking down the sidewalks is like walking through the bottom of a canyon. It’s different from, say, Kansas, where extreme flatness rules the day. More people have chosen to live in Manhattan, New York, than in Manhattan, Kansas. About 1.6 million more. I don’t understand that. I simply cannot understand how that many people can choose to live and/or work in same amount of square area as the other, stacked on top of each other. One of the things I noticed about the more crowded of the two Manhattans was that the traffic going out of the city was always worse than the traffic coming into the city. But more hopeful. I saw an official-looking guy on a bi- cycle, with the words “Pet Control” em- blazoned on the back of his orange vest. People who live in New York City have dogs but don’t have children. No one wants to raise children there. And no one can. People with families live somewhere else, and they commute between the two halves of their lives. In other words, New York is like the whole world, only more so. In the midst of the maze that is Manhattan is the The Old Town Bar. That is where the heroic New York City Chesterton Society meets twice a month. It’s faithful members have to take the train to get their local Chesterton meeting. St. Vincent Ferrer Church

12 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 Rolling Road www.zazzle.com/theobear of them. Apparently, the center of the the name, you’ll see it was not in your Take GKC with you on streets also serve as parking lots. But part of the world. This was Pittsburg, your morning commute. only some people know this. Also ap- Kansas, home of Pitt State University, parently New Yorkers consider these home of the Gorillas. Really. I gave a things normal, because when I pointed talk to the Kansas Catholic College them out to Zubair, he said to me, “You Student Conference. An enthusiastic notice things we don’t notice.” and inspiring group of young people. Since I was in New York City, I made Made me feel young. And hopeful. it a point to do two things that I would Then I got in my rental car and not be able to do anywhere else. I visited drove to Emporia, Kansas. In spite of the glorious St. Vincent Ferrer Church, the lack of any natural obstacles be- a spectacular Gothic masterpiece built tween those two places, there is no di- by the Dominicans. It was a place that rect highway, only a series of small high- makes you look up in amazement even ways headed in a different direction. I more than you would at a skyscrap- didn’t really get to enjoy the vast hor- er. Skyscrapers reach but don’t touch. izontalness of the landscape because I Gothic arches contain heaven. The only drove through a raging blizzard, so that disappointment was that I did not get I could only see a few feet in front of to meet the vicar, who was out of town. me. I saw a few cows covered with snow, His name is Fr. Innocent Smith. Really. and drove through Yates Center, the Hay The other thing I did was go to a Capital of the World. Finally I arrived in New York deli and have a pastrami Emporia, which is the Disc Golf Capital sandwich. Can’t do that anywhere else. of the World. Gave a talk to another en- Not many days later I found my- thusiastic and inspiring group from self in Pittsburg. Now, Vicki Darkey, Emporia State University. More hope FRONT your’e asking why didn’t I look you up? for the world. Because if you’ll notice the spelling of Never made it to Manhattan, Kansas.

BACK 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.

— G.K. CHESTERTON A Short History of England

The only thing Vertical in Kansas

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 13 ALL IS GRIST He also holds, as a corollary, that it is more blessed to worry than to be worried about. In the spirit of Thomas Jefferson, Bidwell believes that he should never put off till tomorrow what he can worry about A Going Concern today. “Worry today,” he told me, “for to- By Joe Campbell morrow never comes.” So, despite his good health, he wor- idwell is a worrier. He worries Bidwell’s. Had Hamlet been like Bidwell, ries about getting sick and dying. But he relentlessly. When he doesn’t Shakespeare would not have written, “To also worries about getting sick and not have anything to worry about, be or not to be, that is the question.” He dying. I don’t mean to suggest that he he worries about not worry- would have written, “To worry or not to supports euthanasia or assisted suicide. ing. That is, he worries lest he worry, that is the question.” As Hamlet He doesn’t. But he also doesn’t support has forgotten something that chose to be, so Bidwell chooses to worry. extraordinary methods of keeping immi- Bought to worry him. Unlike Bishop Berkeley, who said nent death at bay. His worry is that if the Had he been like Bidwell, Descartes that to be is to be perceived, Bidwell says unscrupulous don’t shorten his life, the would not have said, “I think, there- that to be is to be worried about. This, no scrupulous might prolong his death. fore I am.” He would have said, “I wor- doubt, is why he has his own version of “Doesn’t this conflict with your belief ry, therefore I am.” As thinking defined the golden rule: worry about others as that he who worries last, worries best?” I Descartes’ existence, so worrying defines you would have them worry about you. asked him.

✦ ✦ I was reconciled (at the age of seven) to the knowledge that whereby we erect institutions or accept creeds. But I know I would never understand a piano. quite well that whole tracts of humanity can be sunk in spe- GKC on GKC – 13 (Daily Herald, Sept. 13, 1913) cial ignorance or swept with special delusions. (Daily News, Jan. 21, 1911) ✦ ✦ There was once a happy fable in Fleet Street to the effect that I illustrated my defence of the chivalric prejudice by ✦ ✦ I am not so frightened of life that I dare not obstruct it, like standing up in an omnibus and offering my seat to three la- the Nature-worshipper. Nor am I so frightened of life that I dies. Gallantry upon so gargantuan a scale seems almost to have to tie it down with hundreds of little cords, like the hy- have an alarming flavour of polygamy. (New Witness, gienist. My test is whether the life is what can decently Feb. 8, 1917) be called human life, life neither choked with anarchy nor enslaved by fear. (Daily News, Sept. 11, 1909) ✦ ✦ I jolly well know that I would not turn out at night to hear myself lecture even ✦ ✦ I am of the antiquated creed which holds if it was a free entertainment. (Burlington that saying something is often connected Gazette, Feb. 16, 1921 – During his American with having something to say. And, right lecture tour) or wrong, serious conviction is a great help to humorous expression. It is be- ✦ ✦ I wish to acquit myself of the charge cause it is controversial that it is conviv- of contemptuousness. All my life I ial. (New York American, December 8, 1934) have endeavoured to explain that my sympathies are entirely with the mass ✦ ✦ When a man has an original point of of people in their ordinary instincts. I view of his own, it will appear in every- am not a highbrow. I realise that it is this thing he writes. (Week-end Review, June 24, mass of normal people which keeps the 1933) world straight and that, without them, the ✦ ✦ I admit that we writers, wretched beings, have world would soon qualify for a lunatic asylum. only to blame ourselves: though we generally prefer (The Philosopher, July-Sept., 1927) to blame each other. (New York American, Oct. 27, 1934) ✦ ✦ I have been happy in a minority in times when some New ✦ ✦ I should like to write an enormous Miltonic epic about Theology leaders were very placidly in the majority. I do in- the universe and call it “Paradox Regained.” (Illustrated London deed believe that all rule rests on the divine hunger in all News, May 22, 1915) the hearts of men; and that the common conscience is that

14 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 All is Grist

“I’m not sure,” he replied. “I’ll have to He also worries that his savings could fair. Try as I may, I have failed to convince worry about it.” outlast him and he not grow old com- him that we can’t do anything about the His answer surprised me, as he rou- fortably for as long as he had expected. weather. Why, we can’t even predict it. His tinely recasts traditional wisdom to fit his “The ideal, I suppose,” he said, “is for stock reply is “Of course we can do some- worldview. In Bidwell’s universe, necessi- life and money to run out at the same thing about the weather. We can worry ty is not the mother of invention. Worry t i m e .” about it.” is. Worry is also what springs eternal in I asked if his worrying causes him to the human breast, what makes the world lose sleep. go round, and what great minds do alike. One good “Certainly not” he replied. “My in- He has recast “no pain, no gain” into “no somnia causes me to lose sleep. I only worry, no hurry”. worry deserves start worrying after I wake up. As to If you were to tell Bidwell that it is bet- what causes the insomnia, your guess is ter to light a candle than curse the dark- another . as good as mine. I tried dieting to cure it, ness, he would worry about starting a fire. but to no avail.” I know, because when I told him that every “You thought that if you lost weight cloud has a silver lining, he worried about “But surely, Bidwell,” I said, “a longer you’d stop losing sleep?” flooding the market with precious metals. life, even though you die poor, is prefera- “I reasoned that if there were less of As soon as he discovered money, ble to a shorter life, even though you die me, there’d be more sleep to go around.” Bidwell began worrying about it. When rich.” “Bidwell,” I said, as charitably as I he didn’t have it, he worried that he might “An interesting point,” he replied. knew how, “I worry about you.” not get it. When he got it, he worried that “Leave it with me and I’ll worry about it.” “One good worry deserves another,” he might not keep it. When he awakens in the morning, he replied, and he welcomed me to share Like many of us, he worries that he Bidwell worries about the weather. If his realization that “as Socrates should could outlive his savings and grow old it’s fair, he worries that it will turn foul. have said, but didn’t, the unworried life less comfortably than he had expected. If it’s foul, he worries that it won’t turn is not worth living”

Lewis and Oxfordian Englishness, some- The Problem With Us one might be able to say of us, “Hey, man, glass houses.” And fair enough, though Chestertonians I don’t think we imitate Chesterton the way the young Evangelicals imi- By David Mills tate Lewis. Most of us, I think, are natural Chestertonians who then discover the man who put this way of living and hey always took up pipes, they were really saying “Hey mom, I’m thinking into compelling words. never cigarettes. Their hero not in Cedar Rapids anymore!” We enjoy what we might call had smoked cigarettes like a They quoted C. S. Lewis for every- “Lifestyle Chestertonianism.” I don’t fiend, but cigarettes choked thing. There did not seem to be a subject know anyone who dresses like him or you and made you look trashy to which some quote applied, or could wears those funny glasses or that odd and made your tweed jacket be made to apply with a little pushing or moustache. But a lot of us enjoy the an- with the leather elbow patch- stretching. It was cute, though not as cute ti-puritan life, the life pursued by doing esT stink. So no cigarettes. as the pipes and the tweed. things with more enthusiasm and less These were young Evangelicals who’d care than the modern puritans can tol- discovered C. S. Lewis and through him a erate. It’s the life that laughs carelessly at romantic idea of England, or a select part We enjoy what we the fears that drive the modern puritans, of England. (They wouldn’t have been so might call “Lifestyle that enjoys this-worldly pleasures with happy with a Labour party rally in a min- insouciance because it insists upon the ing town in 1932. It’s Tory privilege they Chestertonianism ”. reality of the next world. liked.) We used to see them in the local The Lifestyle Chestertonians drink pubs when we lived near an Evangelical We Chestertonians more than the proper number of daily college, and (we were Episcopalians “units” the health puritans allow. They then) in our parish as well. When they I’m afraid, my Chestertonian friends, smoke, though the health puritans don’t pulled their pipes from their mouths to that as we smile with amusement at our allow that at all. They eat big slabs of rare drink from their beer glasses, I suspected young Evangelical brethren smitten by steak and large butter-covered potatoes,

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 15 All is Grist which leaves the puritans wringing their A reporter for the Victoria Daily Times (Mar. hands and muttering “cholesterol.” 12, 1931) described Chesterton during an They argue and laugh and argue more, and take greater pleasure be- interview at the Empress Hotel in British cause the manners puritans think it in- Columbia: decorous. They thumb their noses at He had a ruddy, somewhat rounded face with a both major political parties and their high, broad forehead; thin slightly grey hair that ideologies, when the political puritans embraced the upper part of the his ears; a mous- demand you take just one of two pre- tache of a sandier color that hooked down below viously defined sides. They speak for his mouth. His large eyes twinkled. They branded Christian truths as if they were un- Chesterton as unavoidably genial, in spite of his doubtedly true, waving away the ideo- heavy eyebrows, his aggressive nose. Layers of chin tapered down into the folds logical puritans — secularists that they of an ample winged collar. His skin was fair, delicate. He held a cigar in his right are — who insist that everyone hold his hand, but his left hand frequently tapped the cushions, especially when he was beliefs as if they might well be wrong. thinking. His replies to the interviewers were often followed by a cavernous chor- These are all fine things, the beer tle, and his whole body shook and shifted around on the settee. and the steak and the faith. I would have to admit, however, that we might push them farther than we would if they weren’t Chestertonian. We enjoy This is the problem: It’s not a good think he’s just giving his readers the best good beer, but drinking it becomes a way to engage the world if you want to stuff he can supply, but he really tells the sign of virtue, because that’s what good move people’s minds and hearts. I love reader that he doesn’t know anything Chestertonians do. There’s the extra Chesterton and I’ve learned a great deal but what his authority tells him. pint, or two, or three. The larger cigar. from him. Reading him changed my The unnecessarily loud dinner, the in- mind in the stricter sense of that phrase. Moving On From Chesterton your-face political eccentricity, and the He’s one of my heroes. But. Even with a pointlessly provocative statements of receptive, even with a docile, audience, The problem is our invoking Chesterton Christian belief. you can’t quote Chesterton very much rather than using him, depending I know this from my own life. I can without your readers or hearers begin- on him to do our work for us. It’s our be bad enough on my own, but with ning to block you out. speaking as devotees and not as students other Chestertonians, well, let’s just say This strikes us Chestertonians as who’ve graduated and moved on to be things can get exuberant. weird. Bats. Crackers. It’s like someone teachers ourselves. The answer is Aristotelian or complaining as he walks through a gal- We need to do with him what he did Thomist, as Chesterton would have said lery in the Louvre that there’s just too with St. Thomas Aquinas: Learn both his if asked: moderation. Be a Chestertonian much great art here. Does he want bad way of thinking and specific arguments within limits. Free yourself from mod- art? Blank walls? What? You go to a mu- and then use what we’ve learned for our ern Puritan fears, but don’t take your seum like the Louvre to see great art. You own purposes and in our own voices. liberation so far that you prove they read books hoping for great arguments. Do what he did with St. Thomas. were right. These Chesterton supplies by the boat Compare some philosophers’ expla- load. nations of what Thomas is doing with The Problem With Chestertonians But that’s not the way the aver- Chesterton’s Dumb Ox and all his other age reader takes it. To the average books that express his Thomistic mind. It’s the quoting, though, that’s the prob- reader, “Chesterton said” followed The few people who are called to the lem with us Chestertonians I’m most by “Chesterton said” followed by work will read the philosophers with worried about, at least those of us who “Chesterton said” often means “Time benefit (though possibly not with plea- write or speak. Those who don’t have to look at the next article.” And if he sure, because those books can be really reason to quote him may read him to picks up the same writer again and finds dry), but nearly every reader can enjoy the neglect of people they should be “Chesterton said,” he’s likely to skip to and learn from Chesterton and through reading instead. the next article even faster. him become Thomists at second hand. I speak as a writer who knows the It has to do with the reader’s in- Lifestyle Chestertonianism is great. temptation, and also as an editor and a stinctive feeling that he wants to read Beer! Steak! Cigars! Laughter! Enraged reader who knows the effect. This is the someone who knows something on his Puritans! But we also have truths to pass temptation: The man nailed it so often own. He wants to read an authority. on, and the greatest Chestertonian will and made his points so cleverly, wittily, Too many quotes, especially too many be one who’s so absorbed Chesterton’s and slap-your-forehead insightfully that quotes from one source, makes the read- thinking that no one — no one but an- we don’t have much reason say to any- er suspect the writer doesn’t really know other, shrewd Chestertonian — will rec- thing on our own (or read other writers). what he’s talking about. The writer make ognize him as one.

16 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 New from ACS Books ow do we defend the faith in today’s world? Where are the connecting points with an audience that does not like or does not Heven care about religion? What will prevent us from being merely re- actionary? Surprisingly, the best strategy may come from a writer who antici- pated our present problem a hundred years ago: G.K. Chesterton. In this scholarly, yet scrappy approach, English Priest and Former Boxer Paul Rowan masterfully makes the case of how Chesterton can be used to develop a new apologetics to engage the post-modern age.

“As an apologist Chesterton was nothing if not counter-cul- “Father Rowan...puts Peter in dialogue with Pan.” tural, yet what emerges wonderfully from these pages is —CHARLES J. SCICLUNA Archbishop of Malta his great human warmth and Catholic generosity of spirit. G.K. is not merely a captivating figure from the past, he is also—as again and again we are reminded in this thought- “Chesterton fights in the heavy-weight division, and rains ful and compelling study—a necessary contemporary at a devastating blows of logic and common sense. Father time of great confusion, a thinker, a celebrant of the faith, a Rowan gives us a ringside seat.” radiant apostle still one step ahead of us.” —DALE AHLQUIST, President of the —FATHER PAUL MURRAY, OP Consultor to the American Chesterton Society Congregation for the Causes of Saints, Vatican

“Recent popes have summoned Christians to an evangeli- $24.95 zation “new in its ardor, new in its methods and new in its expression” (Pope St. John Paul II). This is exactly where the inspiring figure and personality of G. K. Chesterton, together with his writings and bon mots, can assist Christians both in their own growth and in their witness to others.” —PHILIP EGAN, Bishop of Portsmouth, England

To order call (800) 343-2425 or visit ACS BOOKS www.chesterton.org CHESTERTON’S GREAT CHARACTERS consists in saying ‘Lord Jones Dead’ to people who never knew that Lord Jones was alive.” Finn amiably puts Nutt in his place, writing that, “you don’t believe in Edward Nutt anything, not even in journalism.” And the party line disbelief in the supernat- By Chris Chan ural that so often dominates the culture is punctured with the observation, “If a Mr. Edward Nutt, the industrious editor of The Daily Reformer, sat at his desk, open- miracle happened in your office, you’d ing letters and marking proofs to the merry tune of a typewriter, worked by a vigor- have to hush it up.” ous young lady. Over the course of the story, it is re- He was a stoutish, fair man, in his shirt-sleeves; his movements were resolute, his vealed that Finn and Father Brown are mouth firm and his tones final; but his round, rather babyish blue eyes had a bewil- uncovering a long-buried secret of an dered and even wistful look that rather contradicted all this. Nor indeed was the ex- aristocratic family. If the true story were pression altogether misleading. It might truly be said of him, as of many journalists in to be told, the romantic aura that often authority, that his most familiar emotion was one of continuous fear; fear of libel ac- envelops the nobility would be swept tions, fear of lost advertisements, fear of misprints, fear of the sack. away. Historically speaking, many mem- His life was a series of distracted compromises, between the proprietor of the pa- bers of the aristocracy live off the glori- per (and of him), who was a senile soap-boiler with three ineradicable mistakes in his ous deeds (or at the very least, the op- mind, and the very able staff he had collected to run the paper; some of whom were portunity-seizing) of centuries-old brilliant and experienced men and (what was even worse) sincere enthusiasts for the ancestors. As Father Brown observes political policy of the paper. near the end of the tale, there’s nothing A letter from one of these lay immediately before him; and rapid and resolute as very worthy of respect in many aristo- he was, he seemed almost to hesitate before opening it. He took up a strip of proof in- crats, and the good father sees it as his stead, ran down it with a blue eye, and a blue pencil, altered the word “adultery” to the duty to break the wall of superstition that word “impropriety,” and the word “Jew” to the word “Alien,” rang a bell and sent it fly- gives some nobles and undeserved air of ing upstairs. —”THE PURPLE WIG” mysteriousness. This attitude is anathematic to Nutt. he first three essays in this se- “The Purple Wig” is an unusual Though the editor doesn’t believe in ries have focused on major Father Brown story because much of it is curses and family ghosts, he is a wide- characters in Chesterton’s work. told in the first person by the journalist eyed believer in the worldly benefits that This article discusses a charac- Francis Finn, in the form of an in-depth come from sucking up to the wealthy and ter who has only one brief ap- article meant as an exposé of the shady powerful. Allying oneself with aristocrats pearance in a Father Brown and sordid lives of the aristocracy. The can bring one wealth, honors, and polit- shortT story, but who makes an indelible introduction, middle, and end of the sto- ical advantages. In essence, Nutt kills a impression. Nutt is the embodiment of ry are written in the third person. piece of investigative journalism for the how custom can become cowardice, as sole reason that it might embarrass a no- he kowtows to every perceived prejudice Some journalists bleman who exercises influence over his amongst his readership, particularly an- career. This is a clear case of censorship ti-religious bigotry. boast of “afflicting bythe press. His very surname is a jab at the ridic- Some journalists boast of “afflicting ulousness of his editorial policy and busi- the comfortable the comfortable and comforting the af- ness plan. His first name further identi- flicted,” a goal that often distracts from fies him as a product of the spirit of his and comforting simple truth-telling in reporting. Nutt time, showing how the Edwardian era is an editor who believes in kowtowing was marred by petty self-righteousness the afflicted ”. to the powerful, and who thinks noth- and often undetected hypocrisies. Not ing of keeping the public uninformed only that, but the title of his publication is In contemporary popular culture, and afraid as long as his paycheck keeps deliberately ironic. There is no “reform- journalists are often presented as the up- coming in on time. In recent times, “fake ing” spirit in the newspaper. It is quite holders of truth-telling and revealing news” has been used to described clearly content to nourish and cultivate existing dark secrets to the public. Chesterton false statements for propaganda purpos- popular sins. Nutt has no desire to make expertly demythologizes the professions es, but as Chesterton illustrates through the world better; where Chesterton spoke and skewers the pretensions many jour- Nutt, “fake news” also consists of jour- of a church that moved the world instead nalists have for being the last best hope nalists pushing obviously false narratives of moving with the world, Nutt is con- of journalism and freedom. “The Purple and refusing to address the secrets that tent to adjust his step to the tune that the Wig” contains some Chestertonian gems, certain people use to gain or maintain world calls. such as, “I know that journalism largely their grip on power.

18 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 THE FLYING INN do not have a pick. Set your burning bar- Home Rule at Home rel about 30 yards from the nearest building on some sand or gravel. It needs a screen or spark arrestor to stop sparks from blowing out. I used ¼ inch hard- ware cloth, which is metal screen used for animal cages. I wired it to an old steel gate, and set this on the drum when there is a fire going. Environmentalism There are a few tricks you need to David Beresford know to use a burning barrel. Never, ever, ever use gasoline. If you are tempt- ed to use gasoline, do not do so. Did I say And Alfred, bowing heavily, load, or $10.38 in firewood. Or, if you not to use gasoline? Gasoline evaporates, Sat down the fire to stir, prefer, a tree 5 inches thick. and from the time it takes to pour it, then —THE BALLAD OF THE WHITE HORSE This mania for saving garbage is given look for a match, there is a gas cloud in VERSE 75-76, G. K. CHESTERTON its most zealous expression in the recy- the air in front of you, and there is a real cling industry. Where we live, the munic- danger that when you light it you will be he food service that runs the ipality passed a bylaw before Christmas in the middle of a burning cloud. Lots of coffee shops where I work that garbage must be set out in clear people have died this way, including fire- gave away free coffee to any- plastic bags, and anyone who throws out men who should have known better so one who brought a mug. The something that can be recycled will be never use gasoline. idea was to get people to stop fined. Recyclable items include tin cans, However, diesel fuel, stove oil, vege- using paper cups. The pur- glass, all cardboard or paper, and a vari- table oil, or heating oil are all good fire pose behind this was to save ety of plastics, and all of these must be starters. I put my garbage bag into the theT environment. Paper cups, it seems, sorted for pickup in their own bags or barrel, tear open the top and pour in are a scourge on the environment. We are else we will be fined. The ostensible rea- about half a pint of heating oil into the not sure why they are a scourge, but they son behind this is to divert material from bag. Then I light a piece of paper and are. Just think about it! Do you want pa- going to the landfill, which is a delight- toss it in, then put the screen lid on. If per cups everywhere? fully misleading euphemism for sending you stick to burning two or three gar- A cup of coffee is $2, and according to less garbage to the dump—or else! bage bags at a time, you do not need to the sign at the counter, this initiative has There is an easy solution to keeping the do much missing. If you are burning wet saved 2000 cups from going into landfill; landfill free of garbage. A burning barrel. items like moldy potatoes, or old clothes, $20,000 in lost revenues toward a good To make a burning barrel, just get then you will need to stir the fire with a cause! an old 45 gallon steel drum. Put some shovel. Try not to breath the smoke, es- The people who work at the count- holes along the bottom edge so the fire pecially when you are burning plastic. er have had their parking privileges re- can breathe. I use a pick and punch ½ It is fun to have a burning barrel, it moved. These are the lowest paid people inch holes around the steel drum about makes a nice family chore on Saturday at the office, and parking is about 300$/ 4 inches up from the bottom. There is mornings, and I am kind of happy that year—what with cut-backs, rationaliza- no need to be fussy about this, a screw- our town council made such a stupid tion, and market forces, the company can driver and hammer will also work if you law. no longer afford to pay for parking for people who work at the food counter. I can see the company’s point of view, if you are committed to giving away your main product free of cost just to save the environment, it is hard to find the money to pay the parking fees of your workers. It takes 33 grams of wood and bark to make a paper cup, or 0.073 pounds. There are about 40 pounds of softwood per cubic foot, and 128 cubic feet of wood in a cord of firewood. A cord of firewood costs $365 cut split and delivered. Working out the math means that it cost $20,000 of lost revenue to save 3 ½ cubic feet of wood, about a wheelbarrow

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 19 VARIED TYPES By age 14 or 15, many kids can work through Orthodoxy on a chap- “No Devil Worshipers Please ”. —G.K. CHESTERTON ter-by-chapter basis. It helps if they have an instructor who will walk through it with them, perhaps using Socratic dialogue style... taking it slowly, and thor- oughly discussing the philosophical and theological issues as they come up. Passing the Torch By later in the high school years, The Everlasting Man is a great piece to study. By Victoria Darkey By that time Chesterton’s social com- mentary, his literary criticism, and most handful of times over the which might work well for a book club of his other works of fiction are also re- past few years, exchanges like format. It is available from the online ally enjoyable, especially for students the following have passed bookstore at the American Chesterton who’ve earlier learned to read him in his through my email box. I share Society website. more basic works. Both Orthodoxy and this in hopes that it might en- Next, for many teens and some pre- The Everlasting Man are available as au- courage you, as you endeavor teens, Chesterton’s poetry is a great dio editions. These can be very helpful Ato pass the torch. starting point. Some of his histori- for some students. Also, in a club or co- cal poetry may be very applicable to op setting, selected key passages could be Ms. Darkey, your idea of forming a club of budding listened to by the group, and then dis- We are a homeschooling family and my Chestertonians. Lepanto is a great one cussed or written about. older boys (ages 13 and 11) have been to start with. Having the students dig Lastly, Gilbert! magazine may pro- reading Chesterton for a couple of years up the historical background is a valu- vide some inspiration for a Chesterton now and really enjoy it. We absolutely able exercise not only from an historical club for teens. Gilbert! is published love “The Apostle of Common Sense” point of view, but also from a spiritual bi-monthly and a subscription is includ- and try to watch it each week. They have one. To help with this, I would recom- ed with the purchase of a membership to read many of the Fr. Brown stories and mend the audio materials produced by the American Chesterton Society. Club two of Dale Ahlquist’s books. My old- Mr. Christopher Check, as well as many members or their families could sub- er son has read St . Thomas Aquinas and of the articles he’s written on the subject scribe and use some of the club time to The Man Who Was Thursday. They want that can be found by putting the names talk about the articles, many of which are to start a club with their fellow homes- ‘Christopher Check’ and “Lepanto” into written by Chesterton himself and not choolers and we would just like some an internet search engine. The oth- currently published anywhere else. pointers on where to start. We are try- er poetry by Chesterton that your sons Before I close, I’d like to say that there ing to make the club a discussion, de- might consider is The Ballad of the White is no real substitute for parental involve- bate, and apologetics type program…I Horse. This is an epic action/adventure ment and enthusiasm. Chesterton him- appreciate any input with this. I didn’t poem beautifully describing an import- self once wrote, “Education is only truth think the adult groups would be an ap- ant page out of the history of English in a state of transmission; and how can propriate place to begin... Christendom. Seton Press and Ignatius we pass on truth if it has never come into Thank you, Press have both published annotated our hand?” If you yourself have read and A Parent Educator editions, which are suited for introduc- enjoyed Chesterton, you can best know Dear Parent Educator, ing readers to the poem. The Seton Press how to filter what of his writing will be As you’ve discovered, before the edition includes some nice illustrations effective in developing a love and ap- high school years Father Brown stories, and an interesting typeface that makes it preciation for Chesterton in your kids quotes, and some of the books about very attractive, especially to young peo- and their friends. If you can inspire a Chesterton are good places to begin. ple. These are also available in the ACS Chestertonian interest in the parents of A good biography of Chesterton web store. the kids you are reaching out to, it will can go a long way to build a founda- Chesterton was a master of the es- also really help. Perhaps connecting with tion for understanding Chesterton, say, and it would be an over site to dis- a local Chesterton Society would be a and you might consider the biography cuss Chesterton for young people with good way to accomplish this. called Wisdom and Innocence by Joseph out mentioning his essays. The book Please let me know how things work Pearce. You mentioned that your teen- In Defense of Sanity (edited by Dale out for you and your kids. age son read Chesterton on Aquinas. Ahlquist, published by Ignatius Press) You might have him read Chesterton’s is a compilation of Chesterton’s essays Please donate to the American St . Francis of Assisi. There is a study that is full of essays that are witty and yet Chesterton Society. guide to accompany the St. Francis bi- poignant, and can be enjoyed by readers www.chesterton.org ography by Nancy Carpentier Brown, young and old.

20 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 ALL I SURVEY But such caution and subterfuge is not “It is true that I am of an older fashion; much that I love his ordinary attitude toward Frances and has been destroyed or sent into exile ”. —G.K. CHESTERTON their eventual engagement. He tended to let too much out of the bag in his letters. To friend Mildred Wain he wrote, “On rising this morning, I carefully washed my boots in hot water and blacked my face. Then assuming my coat with grace- ful ease and with the tails in front, I de- scended to breakfast, where I gaily Name the Date poured the coffee on the sardines and put my hat on the fire to boil. These activities By David Fagerberg will give you some idea of my frame of mind. My family, observing me leave the ere’s an essay on a topic about only learned the last names for approxi- house by way of the chimney, and take the which I shan’t ever have to mately 20 of them.” fender with me under one arm, thought worry. Dating. After 40 years Lest you breathe too heavy a sigh of I must have something on my mind. So I of marriage, even should I be relief, know that this article adds the om- had. My friend, I am engaged.” widowed (or for a man, would inous fact that even with the first name To his mother, he admitted he went that be widowered?) I expect alone, an amateur sleuth can figure out to Bedford Park every Sunday for more Hthat (as Chesterton quotes Swinburne last names by linking with the person’s than the scenery. It was rather “spent in saying) “not twice on earth do the gods place of work, or alma mater. Were he enjoying a very intimate, but quite breezy do this,” and I would not try to repeat online today, we could try “Gilbert, Slade and Platonic friendship with Frances perfection. But dedicated as I am to lurk- Blogg [Ha! Chesterton was the original ing in modernism’s bushes to observe Blogger], reading, talking and enjoying technology advancing us toward greater life together, having great sympathies on and greater happiness, as it promises to Some revelations all subjects; and … making the thrilling, do, I sometimes notice certain trends and but painfully responsible discovery that report on them as a service to you read- should be Platonism, on my side, had not the field ers. A recent example follows. by any means to itself.” There is a new concern for the dat- sipped slowly . He wrote numerous letters to Frances, ing crowd, a worrisome, troublesome herself, perhaps addressing them to development causing anxiety. It is not DaddyzPrincess29. And maybe his fa- where to find a spouse; it is not how to Art School” or “Gil, Illustrated London mous “G.K.C.” closure already expresses win the heart of your beloved; it is not News.” Another option is to casual- his unwillingness to reveal in public his even where to find a date. It is encapsu- ly ask for your date’s “social media han- last name. Because, you know, he was so lated in this dramatic, frightening, but dle” and jot it down when she reveals shy. So tentative. So unwilling to reveal true account: “One warm summer night, “DaddyzPrincess29.” Finally, if one has his opinion on matters. [Name] was sitting along the Chicago to resort to old-fashioned spy techniques, Here is the one plus I think G., or Gil, River with a man she had been dating for take a peek at an Uber account, or the or G.K. would give to this practice. The more than three months. As they talk- credit card used to pay for the meal. online crowd is hiding their opinions on ed about the future, sipping blue Tiki As usual, our friend Chesterton politics and religion, keeping secret their drinks, he popped the question: ‘What’s stands well in advance of the times. He past employment record, where they your last name?’” admits to Frances in a letter from 1898, have lived, their joys and sorrows and Why this dreadful apprehension while they were still only engaged, that he dreams, because these are all the things about revealing one’s last name? Because has a pseudonym prepared. At Unwin’s that make up the wild adventure of get- “many millennials say asking directly Publishers he was editing illustrations for ting to know another person, and such for a last name on a first date feels awk- a History of China, and though he admits discoveries should be savored. Some rev- ward, and signals too obviously they in- that all his knowledge comes from read- elations should be sipped slowly: the rev- tend to scour the internet for biographi- ing the book he is editing, he can now elation of God to mankind, and the reve- cal information.” This is an unacceptable “airily talk of La-o-tsee and Wu-sank- lation of one man to one woman. He and level of intimacy. “The less I know, the Wei, criticize Chung-tang and Fu-Tche, Frances spent their time reading, talking, better,” says one. “Once you have the last compare Tchieu Lung with his great suc- having great sympathies on all subjects. name, that unlocks this whole new uni- cessor, whose name I have forgotten…. Perhaps the hesitant daters are looking verse of information,” another observes. Before I have done I hope people will be to restore some mystery to romance. If A third admits “she has been on more looking behind for my pig-tail. The name so, they should come to a master like Mr. than 300 first dates since 2010, but has I shall adopt will be Tches-Ter-Ton.” Tches-Ter-Ton for help.

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 21 CHESTERTON UNIVERSITY That Bigoted People Have No Beliefs An Introduction to the Writings of G .K . Chesterton by Dale Ahlquist That the Simple Life Is an Artificial Nuisance That Humour Is an Overrated Quality

That series was followed by another series under the heading,“The Creed of a Credulous Person” in which he gives an account “of the funny things I believe” A Primer in Paradox such as fairies, Santa Claus, talking ani- Black and White, 1903-1904 mals, and the idea “that all things called inanimate are really animate.” He argues s a rising young journalist, theory that black is white, I may be per- that it is better to be credulous than to be looking to find reasons to mitted to make. a skeptic, because to refuse to be “taken submit anything anywhere, The simplest and commonest of all in” is to refuse to see the inside of any- G.K. Chesterton was read- the causes which lead to the charge thing. The skeptic “would rather be out- ing a copy of a weekly re- of “mere paradox” being slung about side everything than inside Heaven.” view, when he was struck by as it is, is one fundamental assump- It is held that to believe in fairies, griffins, the title of the publication: tion. Everybody takes it for granted vampires and such things has a disquiet- Black and White. He wondered vaguely that universal and ordinary arrange- A ing effect. Nothing could be more mistak- what would happen if he “could succeed ments, historic institutions, daily habits en. It is the people who believe in these in proving that black was white.” are reasonable. They are good, they are things who are sane and ordinary and sensible, they are holy and splendid of- I should, I suppose, be hurled from the eat large breakfasts and sleep like logs. ten enough, but they are not reasonable. office, have a brief career of glory, and Who are the people who believe in the They are themselves paradoxes; paradox die by the hand of a subscriber. But this fairies? Rustics, six feet high, as calm as is built into the very foundations of hu- question has often been brought be- cows; mountaineers, who hang to preci- man affairs. fore me, because I have been accused, pices laughing; hunters, who slay gigantic Then began a series of articles un- by seven different persons of wishing to beasts; kings and warriors, whose hands der the general heading “That Black is prove that black is white—a thing I have and heads are steady in the topsy-turvy- White.” The titles of the essays were: never desired, but which I now feel in- dom of battle; and above all, children. clined to attempt. At any rate, a few re- That Black Is, in a General Sense, White Children, who of most people have most marks on the nature of paradox (as it That Respectable People Are More power of throwing off morbidity and of is called), on the general philosophical Interesting Than Bohemians laughing through tears. Rustics, fighting men and babies do not go mad; they are kept from that by their belief in the su- pernatural. Professors go mad, ingenious inquirers go mad, philosophers go mad, psychologists go mad, young and ear- nest suburban agnostics go mad and take laudanum.

It is likely that these essays established the young Chesterton’s reputation as a purveyor of paradox. It was thought that he was being paradoxical merely for effect. No one, surely, could actually believe that Chesterton actually believed the things he was saying. But there is a point to his paradoxes. He claims he is “pointing out an el- ement of mere blunder and blank mis- take in many of the current assertions,” that he is contradicting people and rais- ing difficulties to show that many of our accepted ideas are nonsense.

22 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 Chesterton University

One of them, to take a random example, himself or please his fellow-creatures, just isolated logic can be maddening. The is the perpetual modern nonsense wheth- as he might be distracted about whether main theme? “The age needs, first and er we are egoists or altruists; the only an- he should be in time for the first act of an foremost, to be startled; to be taught the swer to which question is to fell the in- opera, or see out the tail-end of a sunset. nature of wonder.” quirer to the earth. It is assumed, in the But this is a merely accidental opposition, There was a final series of essays in face of patent common-sense, that there it is not an integral one; there is no in- Black and White, exploring the decline is some kind of interior and natural oppo- trinsic inconsistency between happiness of the amateur, from “The Decline of the sitio n between enjoying yourself and en- for others and for oneself any more than Amateur Dancer” to that of the amateur joying other people. The pert and ethical there is between operas and sunsets. actor, critic, educator, politician, and modern altruist says, “Thou shalt love thy We see in these essays, a foreshad- soldier. These presage the great dictum neighbour rather than thyself.” Of course, owing of the arguments that will appear which would appear in 1910 in What’s it is perfectly obvious that upon any one four years later in Orthodoxy: that po- Wrong with the World: “A thing worth particular occasion a man might be dis- etry and imagination are sane, and that doing is worth doing badly.” tracted as to whether he should please

The Man Who • The man who will defend his field history can be dangerous is not in the sense that the infor- and• defy his Government is just the mation is partial or is small in quantity; but in the sense sort of man who will defend his Government and defy the that it is received out of proportion and in the wrong or- world. (New Witness, Aug. 16, 1917) der. (New Witness, Nov. 4, 1915) • The man who is ten years behind his time is always • In practice a conservative commonly means a man ten• years nearer to the return of that time. (Illustrated London who• cannot remember anything before yesterday, and a News, Dec. 16, 1905) progressive means a man who cannot imagine anything beyond to-morrow. Both suffer from the unnatural nar- The man who says that ideas are mere material results • rowness of supposing that all generations led up to one has• in that very sentence destroyed all ideas, including that generation; but for one it is the last generation and for the one. (New Witness, Dec. 9, 1921) other the next generation. (New Witness, May 14, 1920) It is almost always a man who is not a Christian who • The man who is happy is naturally and necessarily su- reproaches• the crusader with not being a Christian. (New • perior• to the man who is weary. (“A Defence of Bores,” Lunacy Witness, Mar. 17, 1922) and Letters) • The heretic (who is also the fanatic) is not a man who loves• truth too much; no man can love truth too much. The heretic is a man who loves his truth more than truth itself. He prefers the half-truth that he has found to the whole truth which humanity has found. (T.P.’s Weekly, Christmas Number, 1907) • A man who professes a creed confesses a partiality for the• creed; when he loves it he is necessarily partial. But when he hates it he generally professes to be impartial. He pretends that the thing he hates is obstructing his way to other things; such as education or hygiene or science or social reform. (New Witness, June 30, 1922) • An absent-minded man is a good-natured man. It means• a man who, if he happens to see you, will apolo- gize. (The Man Who Was Thursday) • A man who can only read a daily paper is ill-educated;• but this is not because the affairs in the daily paper are unworthy of the intellect. They are not. It is because the affairs in the daily paper are for him a tangle of tails with no heads to them. It is like reading only the last chapters of a hundred complicated serials. The newspaper reader knows too little about the polis [Greek: city] and too much about the police. And the only sense in which popular science or

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 23 BOOK REVIEW Mr. Reyburn also has to face the challenge of not getting lost writing about a writer who writes about writing. Chesterton says that, as one who has been “doomed both to read and write” he has been “denied all the joys of the division of labour.” Reading Both the Book and Mr. Reyburn wisely (I say “wisely” because I would do it the same way) What the Book is About. chooses to approach Chesterton’s writings as a whole, rather than trying to Seeing Things as They Are: G.K. trace the development of his thought. Chesterton and the Drama of Meaning The more I read and re-read Chesterton By Duncan Reyburn the more that I marvel at the consisten- Cascade Books, 2016 cy of his ideas across the whole of his 298 pages career. His conversion does not notice- ably change his written narrative. Mr. Reviewed by Dale Ahlquist Reyburn recognizes the same thing. Thus when surrounding an idea, he draws on n The Victorian Age in Literature, texts from Chesterton’s entire career. The Chesterton says, “There is some- topics he has Chesterton treat are literary thing mediaeval, and therefore criticism, patriotism, cosmology, episte- manful, about writing a book about mology, and ontology. everything in the world.” Again, those last two are not terms In that case, Duncan Reyburn that we catch Chesterton using, but he Ihas written a book that is medieval and sums them up by saying “meaning must manful. Ironically, the book purports to have someone to mean it” and “seeing be only about G.K. Chesterton, but since truth must mean the appreciation of be- Chesterton wrote about everything, Mr. ing by some mind capable of appreciating Reyburn has done the same. it.” Chesterton can state things simply, This is a book about everything. Not but Mr. Reyburn shows how he can also just because it is about G.K. Chesterton, coordinates of interpretive understand- reinforce simple ideas with a bulwark of which would be enough to make it about ing.” As a formal discipline, hermeneutics profound thought and rich language. everything, but because it is about how is relatively new, and one that Chesterton Conclusion: reality is dramatic. Here Chesterton approaches and expounds was not familiar with as such, but it is is a ticket to the show. on meaning, which necessarily includes a rich ground with which to consider everything. It may be one of the most GKC, because he always found meaning scholarly books on Chesterton to date, in everything, whether in a text, a histor- drawing on more material than any other ical event, a contemporary trend, or in a “We all feel the riddle of the earth treatment, and yet it is surprisingly com- stone or a cloud. He was always trying to without anyone to point it out. The pact. The author has resisted narrowing explain not only the mysterious, but the mystery of life is the plainest part Chesterton, as so many other scholars much more difficult thing to explain: the of it. The clouds and curtains of tend to do. obvious. On the one hand, Mr. Reyburn darkness, the confounding va- Chesterton scholarship has finally has to wrestle with the paradox of getting pours, these are the daily weather reached the point where there have been at reality in a writer whose central theme of this world. Whatever else we enough works written about Chesterton is mystery. On the other, there is the co- so that scholars are referring to each oth- nundrum of grappling with a text that is have grown accustomed to, we er. Mr. Reyburn gives the scholars their interpreting the real world creatively, us- have grown accustomed to the due, but the strength of this book is that ing the Creator as the reference point. We unaccountable. Every stone or he cites what Chesterton actually says have a direct relationship with the Truth, flower is a hieroglyphic of which rather than what others have said he said. but also an artistic one, which enhances we have lost the key; with every But he gives the scholars all that the plain one. Chesterton is always try- step of our lives we enter into the they could bargain for by approaching ing to make things clear. He’s also trying middle of some story which we Chesterton in the light of philosophi- to make them beautiful, or rather, trying are certain to misunderstand.” cal hermeneutics, “which is the intel- to get us to see their beauty. To see things —GKC, William Blake (1910) lectual discipline that seeks to interro- through the Creator’s eyes is truly “to see gate and appreciate the conditions and things as they are.”

24 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 Book Review

Just like the original, an encounter with Thursday’s Matrix Gabby leads him to invite her (this time “IRL”—In Real Life, pronounced “earl”) Thursday telling it from a different perspective or to a café that turns out to be the sci-fi By Jake Kerr in a different setting than that in the orig- lair of “Anonymous,” the twenty-second Dallas: Shirtsleeve Press, 2017 inal work. Truly great stories are often century version of the Anarchist Council, Paperback, 267 pages; $14.99 mythic—the truths they carry are great- and much like the rebels of the movie (also available on Kindle) er even than the writing they’re conveyed “The Matrix.” in. The story largely follows the original, Reviewed by David Deavel Jake Kerr, because of love of the sto- though adapted for its setting in an on- ry, has dared a reboot—or as the cover line world. It’s not clear that Kerr quite hat should we make has it, “a reimagining”—of The Man Who made a decision about how the char- of the now ubiquitous Was Thursday. A former music industry acters would speak, because the dic- “reboot”? Originally journalist who had studied with the late tion tends to bounce back and forth meaning to restart a Ursula Le Guin at Kenyon College, he between pretty straightforward render- computer’s operating turned to science fiction and fantasy a ings of the original dialogue and the (of- system, the term now number of years ago with a bit of suc- ten blue) clipped language of American also means “to process. His story “The Old Equations” was gamers. (And one can see that he adapted Wduce a distinctly new version of (an es- nominated for the Nebula Award from Chesterton’s dialogue from at least two tablished media franchise, as a film, the Science Fiction Writers of America uses of “Anarchist” for “Anonymous” that TV show, video game, or comic book)” and he has been shortlisted for several slipped in.) Though not a gamer, I found (Dictionary.com). It should also include other awards. And, oh, by the way, he’s the change of setting somewhat clever in- redone stories and novels. Reboots are a self-described atheist. sofar as the magical re- different from adaptations to a differ- That fact proba- alist elements of the ent art form. In the latter, something al- bly accounts for the original story are per- together new is made. “To talk of seeing book’s afterword by a haps more easy to di- ‘Pygmalion’ on the cinema,” Chesterton Christian writer named gest as they happen in wrote, “is like talking of having heard the Matt Mikalatos attesting a virtual world. The Venus of Milo on the trombone, or hav- to a kind of Chesterton- questions of what is real ing bought a very expensive etching of an Wells friendship with and what is appearance essay.” In the reboot, we do the same sto- Kerr and suggesting are in certain ways en- ry in the same form. that Kerr is on to the hanced by the online My wife’s response to the reboot, as questions of God, good, component; late in the well as to “fan fiction” that tells different evil, and appearance ex- story all the characters stories about beloved characters, is fair- plored in Chesterton’s doubt whether their ly direct: “Get your own story! Get your Thursday. I read the experiences are virtu- own characters!” Not merely from desire afterword first, won- al or IRL—and Gabby for marital comity do I concede she has dering what difference doesn’t know at the end a point. It might be one thing to find an Kerr’s unbelief might whether any of them unsuccessful book or story and rewrite make to the telling. Not were either. it better. We know that Shakespeare did much until the ending. Was the reboot worth it? It won’t re- this to many middling plays. But why Kerr’s Thursdaytakes place in the now place Chesterton’s original, though Kerr’s reboot a story already beloved for what polluted and devastated Manhattan of the fast-paced retelling and clever setting it is? Isn’t it hubris to write War and 2100s. Society divides between the haves, change make it a cracking good story Peace…by Dave Deavel? And doesn’t the who mostly live indoors, computer jacks that will, I hope, lead readers to the orig- author run the risk of simply creating a inserted into their heads so that they live inal. There they’ll see Chesterton’s more literary mini-me that is good only for a in an online world, and the have-nots certainly hopeful ending. While Gabriel laugh? Many of the reboots do this by who make their way out in the real world Syme was seized with a sense of “impos- simply mashing genres. Exhibit A: Pride and have to put up with the polluted cli- sible good news,” Gabby Simm now lives and Prejudice and Zombies. mate. Lucian Gregory here is an online more IRL than virtually but without vis- Yet it’s understandable that great sto- advocate of destruction of “Savannah,” ible tokens of romance, human or divine. ries attract this treatment. Humans de- the entire internet system. Gabrielle Perhaps that’s because the atheist Kerr’s sire to imitate what they love. They see Simm, not Gabriel Syme, a young black Sunday, unlike Chesterton’s, represents fictional worlds and want to enter them woman is a “mage” or high-ranking den- Nature (including the Web), but makes and even make them their own. And it’s izen of the online world who encounters no Gospel hints of what or whom he is not impossible that a given author might (virtually) Lucian Gregory, an activist the mask. indeed make a beloved story fresh by who preaches destruction of the internet.

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 25 NEWS WITH VIEWS Compiled by Mark Pilon could “open the doors to evil.” Soon to be followed by gramophones, and birth control!

Dislike? “When the real revolution happens, STANFORD, California—Former Face- it won’t be mentioned in the newspapers.” book executive, Chamath Palihapitiya, told an audience at the Stanford Gradu- ate School of Business that he feels “tremendous guilt” about his role in growing Goo Goo Googly Eyes We think Guilbault has a point. the company. “The short-term, dopa- MOUNTAIN VIEW, California—In the We also think this is going to get very mine-driven feedback loops we’ve creat- interest of selling an infinite amount of confusing. ed are destroying how society works,” he advertising, tech giant Google has ap- said. Citing an example of hoax messag- plied for many patents to cover possible ing in India that led to the lynching of future opportunities. A number of these Saudi Silver Screen seven people, he said, “(I)magine taking patents are for systems monitoring life RIYADH, Saudi Arabia—Our friends that to the extreme, where bad actors can in the home. These include cameras that from the Kingdom are back in the news. now manipulate large swathes of people gather information about personal tastes, Plans have been announced to allow cin- to do anything you want. It’s just a really, as reflected in objects found in the home, emas to open in Saudi Arabia in 2018. really bad state of affairs.” in order to properly tailor advertising ap- This announcement follows those an- Palihapitiya’s admission follows sim- peals. Also included are child monitoring nouncing the lifting of other restrictions, ilar comments from Sean Parker, an ear- systems that would issue verbal warn- such as those against women driving or ly investor in Facebook, who said, “God ings to misbehaving children, and fami- attending sporting events. As for the cin- only knows what it’s doing to our chil- ly monitors that would have Google ad- emas, the first might be open by the time dren’s brains.” vising parents on “areas of improvement.” you read this. This move has been criti- Indeed. cized by Islamic clerics as something that GKC: “(I)t is only inside the home that there is really a place for individuality and liberty.” Google: We’ll see about that.

Madame President? MONTREAL, Quebec—The Federation des femmes du Quebec has a new president, and some of the femmes are not exactly excited. The Federation is Quebec’s largest women’s rights organization. New president “Gabrielle” Bouchard is a “trans woman,” more specifically, a “trans advocate and public educator” with Concordia University’s Center for Gender Advocacy, who said “I think that I have an advantage because I’ve seen both sides. I’ve experienced marginal- ization, even though people say I didn’t.” One feminist who isn’t buying that is Diane Guilbault, a former member of the Fédération who left to start another women’s group. Guilbaut stated that “the experience of a woman who is born a woman is completely different from the experience of a man who decides one day to present himself as a woman.”

26 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 THE SIGNATURE OF MAN most of the satire against suburban villas is written in suburban villas. There is nothing to show that Mr. Mugg, who made his money in pork, likes the aerial perspective of a new architectural style of steel and glass, and he, poor devil, is a more miserable captive than the other, for he cannot write in the papers abus- ing the ugliness of his own house, and the Architecture in Search of Style suburban clerk can. Now all this is to say what most of by G.K. Chesterton these books largely agree in saying— that there is not any modern style that have before me two or three very in- the same in a style that nobody could like is popular in the sense that most people teresting books dealing with archi- very much, so as to be fair all round. In like to look at it, let alone that most peo- tecture. The first impression made the second case the millionaire can and ple would naturally try to build it. A very by all these books is that architecture does tell the architect what sort of house sensible and well balanced little book is at this moment in a very queer he would like. The architect listens sym- called How to Look at Buildings, by Darcy condition—much queerer than at pathetically and then goes away and de- Braddell, makes this point all the more Iany other period. We all know this in a signs something totally different, which pointedly because it is not in any sense away, about what may be called p‑racti- the millionaire is obliged to accept be- a controversial book. It does not pro- cal architecture, especially domestic ar- cause he is afraid of people suggesting fess to go so deep, for example, as anoth- chitecture. Now in the past there have that he knows nothing about art, which er and larger volume called Purpose and been broadly two main social systems— is indeed the case. In both these cases, Admiration, by J. E. Barton, of which I slavery and a rough peasant equality. you will note, a specialist does exactly shall speak in a moment. But the smaller Most men’s houses or huts or what-not what he likes. There is nothing to show handbook makes this point very clear, for have either been made by themselves be- that suburban people really like subur- example, by a comparison with the eigh- cause they had the timber or the clay, or ban villas. Indeed, I strongly suspect that teenth century. The eighteenth century they have been made by their masters for them. The Eskimo made his own house of snow and the Irish peasant generally made his own cabin of mud or peat, which was the real root of his sense of the injustice of landlordism. On the other hand Uncle Tom’s cabin was presumably built for Uncle Tom, and most English cottages were built by squires and testi- fied to their traditionalism, their care- lessness and their natural instinct for the picturesque. But with the growth of modern towns and the reign of specialists a very strange situation has arisen. For most people the houses exist before the householders. Those rows of new villas in the suburbs are built for anybody, that is for nobody. William Morris, thinking of rabbit-hutches, called them man-hutches, but they really wait more like man- traps. They wait for the man who shall come or not as the case may be. However, in the case of the wealthy, the household- er exists before the house. The rich man has to kick his heels in hotels and hor- rid places while an architect is building his house. Now the speculative builders do not know what people would really like, so they build all the houses exactly

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 27 The Signature of Man was ruled throughout by the classical sham Egyptian facades. When the French Admiration writes, ‘The only hope for style and many hold rightly that this clas- king sacrificed the old Gothic Louvre to our civilisation is a hope that something sicism was narrow and cold, but even its make a superb palace in the Medici man- in the way of an imaginative, contagious narrowness was broad in the sense that it ner, most people in the street did think fraternity may once more possess the was as broad as the whole people. As Mr. the palace was superb even though it was spirit of man’. These men are not reac- Braddell writes, ‘In the eighteenth centu- perhaps a little vulgar, like the Medici. tionaries. They defend modern art, they ry all were agreed that as far as they were Now I ask anybody to stand outside a defend modern machinery, but they do concerned classical architecture was vast- very modern building in London and not defend modern architecture because ly superior to what seemed to them the stop each passerby and ask him wheth- it is not there. They agree that modern rude barbarities of Tudor and Jacobean er he really does think ferro-concrete is art must suit modern civilisation, but it architecture’. Today we have none of that. more superb than stone. Hence most of really seems either that there is no mod- Today, that is, we have things that a few these books end in prophecy, the modern art or that there is no modern civil- people admire and we have things that ern substitute for history. They do not isation. How very modern they are can a lot of people put up with, but we have describe the modern style and com- be seen in Mr. Braddell’s curious praise not anything that can be called the taste pare it with any ancient style. They only of something called the Einstein tower, of the age, which in the eighteenth cen- hope that there will one day be a mod- ‘a building whose shape’, he says, ‘is as tury would make a banker and a bank- ern style to describe. Many of them— strange to our eyes as the great German rupt and a crossing-sweeper and even a most of them indeed—are conspicuous- physicist’s ideas are to our minds’. I would poor wretched artist or architect agree ly fair to every period of the past, but enter a mild protest against the idea that that the old Bank of England was a suit- when we come to the present we find the symbol should be ugly because the able and an elegant erection. In other there is no present. There is nothing but idea is unintelligible. If we understand times we feel that the whole communi- our old friend the future. Mr. Braddell Einstein’s ideas by all means let us ex- ty produced its art. We say instinctive- in How to Look at Buildings says, ‘when press them in architecture. If we believe ly that the Egyptians built the Pyramids the day dawns that does see an informed them true let us assert their truth, but I or the Greeks built the Parthenon or the and enthusiastic public opinion, then we object to erecting a weird and extrava- mediaeval Christians built Lincoln or shall see fine architecture, and not in sol- gant building merely to express my own Chartres, but we cannot exactly say that itary instances as we do now, but in large inability to read Chinese. the modern English built the monument quantities as Italy, Rome and Greece From The Listener, January 18, 1933 to Rima, or even the new shops with their once saw it’. Mr. Barton in Purpose and

Chesterton for Today ✦ ✦ When good citizens have ✦ ✦ Practical politics are necessary, but they are in a sense nar- at last settled down peaceful- row; and by themselves they do tend to split the world up into ly under a law, it generally means that they have found a good small sects. Only dogma is sufficiently universal to include way of evading it. (Illustrated London News, May 17, 1913) us all. (G.K.’s Weekly, Oct. 12, 1929)

✦ ✦ If you attempt an actual argument with a modern pa- ✦ ✦ A man can impose education without having it him- per of opposite politics, you will find that no medi- self. But a man cannot hand on tradition with- um is admitted between violence and evasion. out having it himself. (Introduction to The Change: You will have no answer except slanging or Essays on the Land) silence. (“The New Hypocrite,” What’s Wrong ✦ ✦ What has happened today is that a new with the World) generation is in revolt against disorder. It ✦ ✦ The same age which tends to econom- has found that disorder is far more op- ic slavery tends to social anarchy; and pressive than order. (Listener, Dec. 13, 1933) especially to sexual anarchy. So long as ✦ ✦ I support the State when it interferes men can be driven in droves like sheep, with interference. (Illustrated London News, they can be as promiscuous as sheep. (G.K.’s Nov. 15, 1924) Weekly, Mar. 9, 1929) ✦ ✦ I never saw the picture of a prizewinner in ✦ ✦ The sort of liberty which the modern world any Beauty Competition without thinking that I emphatically has not got is the real liberty of the knew several better-looking women living in my own mind. It is no longer a question of liberty from kings and cap- street. (“About Blondes,” As I Was Saying) tains and inquisitors. It is a question of liberty from catch- words and headlines and hypnotic repetitions and all the ✦ ✦ In a world where everything is ridiculous, nothing can be plutocratic platitudes imposed on us by advertisement and ridiculed. You cannot unmask a mask. (Illustrated London News, journalism. (“On Courage and Independence,” The Thing) July 10, 1927)

28 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 THE DISTRIBUTIST on behalf of scepticism; the thing is a contradiction in terms. And the modern malady is that we are perpetually trying to get a revolution without any of those first principles, The Great Disease without any of those dogmas upon which a revolution rests. By G.K. Chesterton Here is the peculiar modern evil. It is that the restless doubt of our day first here is a malady in the modern is wicked to break the boundary of Boer doubts something and sends a crusade intellect that must be stopped. nationality when the same humanitarian against it, and then doubts the crusade; Most of us, I suppose, have felt will tell us that all boundaries of nation- first doubts whether something is consis- its presence at some time or ality are limiting and superstitious? What tent with justice, and then doubts wheth- other. It is this: that the same is the good of a Russian pessimist writer anything should be or can be. The mental activity which is busy ing one book to protest against a peasant modern man has often both doubts si- tearingT down abuses is at the same time being killed, and then writing another multaneously. Even at the moment when busy in tearing down those human prin- book to prove that by eternal philosophi- he is saying that education ought ciples by which alone it is possible to cal principles he oughtto have killed him- to be entirely free from dogma, he is tear down abuses. The modern activity self? What is the use of a skepticism that in his heart wondering whether it would in politics is perpetually being weakened first attacks men for violating morality, not be a good thing if the nation could be by the modern activity in philosophy. No and then attacks the same morality for entirely free from education. Even while sooner has a man’s conscience told him crushing the same men? This perpetu- he is declaring that women ought to have to doubt a certain institution than the al contradiction and weakness accounts votes, he is really doubting whether men man’s modern intelligence immediately for the comparative or the complete fail- ought to have them. tells him to doubt his conscience. Thus ure of the revolutionary spirit through- This is not a weakness: it is a definite most modern revolution is in secret re- out modern Europe. One can understand and frightful disease. Our country is dy- volt against itself. a revolution for democracy; one can un- ing of it. That feebleness which we can The examples of the thing I mean derstand a revolution against democracy; none of us help feeling in a thousand as- are numberless, and any choice of them but one cannot understand the inquiring pects of modern life in the proceedings must be at random. What is the good of modern young man who tries to com- of Parliament, in the babble of society, a revolutionist telling us in a book about bine the two. You can have revolution in the utterances of journalism and the Macedonia that the virginity of women on behalf of democracy or aristocracy; much more wicked and is insulted when the same revolutionist on behalf of God or the devil; on behalf corrupt silences of journalism, in the may tell us in a book about sex that the of Mumbo jumbo and Abracadabra. But compromises of modern religion, which virginity of women is nonsense? What is you cannot have revolution on behalf of are at once cowardly and intolerant all the use of a humanitarian telling us that it revolution. You cannot have revolution this feebleness really springs from the

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4117 Pebblebrook Circle, Minneapolis, MN 55437 (800) 343-2425 www.chesterton.org The Distributist common psychological root. Men have encouraged even our worldlings to doubt what amount of valour and self-sacrifice doubted too much. Men have doubted even the world. and triumph, in a word, what amount of too much ever again to be rebels. Men What sort of fight can they make who martyrdom, can we expect from people have doubted too much ever again to be are taught in the same breath that their whose brains have been perpetually be- even efficient doubters. enemies are immoral, and that morali- wildered in this way? About as much as Such, at least, is the sombre thought ty itself is immoral? What sort of fight we get. that presents itself for a moment to the can a modern revolutionist make against In politics the danger is very definite mind; seriously, I do not doubt that they that misshapen and half-witted sin which indeed. If we do not take great care, we will be in some way made better, but it China has recently poured into South shall really fall headlong into social evo- will be no quiet or evolutionary process. Africa when half an hour before he has lution. Social evolution means invariably They will be tortured and transfigured by been excusing the same sin in the char- the victory of the man who can afford to fire. At present their position and the po- acter of some modern aesthete? What wait; the victory of the man who can af- sition of our country is indeed desperate. sort of fight can a modern sceptic make ford to wait means invariably the victory What is the use of our complain- against the colonists who treat black men of the man with money. ing that our Parliamentary leaders do as beasts, when he has been proving half When once people begin to talk not make a success of Parliament; that an hour before at a scientific discussion about black being not so very black, and our churchmen do not make a suc- that beasts are much the same as black white not so very white we can be per- cess of the church; that even our rev- men? Why should he be troubled when fectly certain that we shall be uncertain olutionists do not make a success of Dr. Clifford tells him that grown-up peo- of everything. The moment men begin to revolution? We have encouraged our ple have no right to teach children ec- say, “Where do you draw the line?” then Parliamentarians to doubt everything, clesiasticism? Mr. Bernard Shaw will tell there is nothing before us but decay or including Parliament. We have encour- him (if it comes to that) that grown-up revolution. aged our churchmen to doubt every- people have no right to teach children From Daily News, November 17, 1906 thing, including the church. anything at all. We have encouraged our revolution- What amount of political energy, ists to talk about evolution. We have what sort of political accomplishment,

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30 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 THE DISTRIBUTIST

CHESTERTON’S MAIL BAG Dear Mr. Chesterton, What is the difference between a chron- Gilbert Keith Chesterton Answers His Mail icler and a historian? Signed, A New Batch of Letters Asking Serious Dear Serious, “What’s the Difference?” A chronicler sometimes told fables; whereas the historian never tells fables, Dear Mr. Chesterton, human souls; they have no business to but only falsehoods. What’s the difference between immo- make them jump like monkeys on a stick. Your friend, rality and indecency? I have no more right to give an unwilling G.K. Chesterton Signed, citizen a sexual shock than to give him (Illustrated London News, Feb. 14, 1931) Neither an electric shock. I have no more right Dear Neither, to come behind him and inflame his pas- There is a sharp and practical severance sions than to come behind him and in- between pure immorality and practical flame his coattails. I am free to pervert Dear Mr. Chesterton, indecency. It is not a difference in the end; his mind and ruin his soul. I must not The difference between ancient vandal- immorality ends in a lower and more ob- have this savage short cut to his instincts. ism and modern vandalism? scure crypt of Tartarus than impropri- Your friend, Signed, ety; it is a difference in the nature of the G.K. Chesterton Planner process. Immorality attacks through the (Daily News, Feb. 19, 1910) mind, and must be repelled by the mind; Dear Planner, indecency is an abrupt attack upon the Vandalism is named after the Vandals, instincts. If you hit a man on the nose he the barbarians who wrecked the clas- may or may not hit back, according to Dear Mr. Chesterton, sic temples and towns. But the barbar- whether he is a Christian or a Tolstoian. What’s the difference between happiness ians did not wreck temples because they But if you hit a man immediately un- and pleasure? liked temples; nor did they ruin towns der the knee he must kick, because he is Signed, because they wanted to live in towns. But an animal, and a nervous automaton. In Both our modern Vandals do ruin the country the same way a sophistry may affect the Dear Both, because they want to live in the country. mind, but an obscenity must affect the Happiness is an end, and pleasure can Our townsmen do carry the town with mind; it is a violence. It may do one of only be a means. them everywhere, not because they like two things equally direct and instinctive; Your friend, the town but because they dislike the it may shock purity or it may inflame im- G.K. Chesterton town. The world is covered with urban purity. But in both cases the process is (Daily News, April 27, 1912) ugliness, not by the people who are pur- brutal and irrational. A picture or a sen- suing it but, on the contrary, by the peo- tence which shocks sensibility or which ple who are supposed to be fleeing it. sharpens sensuality does not offer itself Your friend, for discussion. It is no more open to ar- G.K. Chesterton gument than a squeaking slate pencil is (New York American, June 4, 1932) open to argument, or the choking smell of ether is open to argument. The human victim is drugged—or he is sick. A man reading about a burglary is Dear Mr. Chesterton, not any more likely to commit a burglary. What’s the difference between a dead A man who has seen a pocket picked is body and a dead soul? not in the least likely to become a pick- Signed, pocket. But there is one evil which by its Mortician hold on the imagination (the creative and reproductive part of man) can reproduce Dear Mortician, itself even by report. We have a right to Dead bodies can be comic; it is only dead protect ourselves and especially our top- souls that can be tragic. heavy and groping children against star- Your friend, tling and uncivilised appeals to this in- G.K. Chesterton stinct. Heretics have a legal claim to (“Barnaby Rudge,” Appreciations) persuade human souls to err and sin like

The Magazine of the American Chesterton Society 31 LETTER TO AMERICA Now, oddly enough, the old word was dishonest, and refused to deal di- G K. . Chesterton in the New York American rectly with death. An Undertaker might mean a man who undertook anything; who undertook to supply cat’s meat or linoleum or even (if such a thing were conceivable) liquor. The word Undertaker confesses to a Morticians and Moralists certain Victorian comfort – and cowardice. Indeed, the word Undertaker is cu- by G.K. Chesterton riously like the word Executioner; which again is curiously like the word Executor, here is one little rule or pre- make game of them; but they must play for it might mean executing anything. caution whereby critics might the game fairly. One day a Hangman or Headsman avoid being criticized; where- Mortician is not a very classical word; as the honest fellows were called when by they might be less frequent- but it is better than some. It is better than heroes and martyrs were their clients, ly assailed, stabbed, shot or many that are used by everybody, as the suddenly took it into his head to be very generally destroyed, than they only words that could be used. It is better refined. He objected to being called a deserveT in the ordinary course of things. than the barbarous and monstrous word Hangman, and thought it more gentle- And that is this: that when they criticize “television,” which is a horrible mongrel manly to be called an Executioner. That or satirize something they are not used muddle of Greek and Latin, made up by was really the progress of refinement. to, they should always at the same time somebody who knew neither. It reminds But the Mortician, to do him justice, has criticize the alternative that they are used me of the neologism of the governess in reversed the progress, and gone back to to. So often they take the thing to which Oscar Wilde’s play, who, knowing that plain words. they are accustomed for granted; and a man-hater was called a misanthrope, Future ages may be a little puzzled never throw out a philosophical ques- supposed that a woman-hater could be about these titles; and may very probably tion about why that exists. called a womanthrope. suppose that the Mortician killed men The Lowlander studying the High- Moreover, Mortician is honest; even as well as buried them. But he will be a lander, for instance, ought to say: “These people who do not know any Latin know grand grim figure like the Headsman; wild Highlanders wear petticoats instead what is meant by mortality or mortal dis- and have something like a real Roman of pantaloons; let us therefore plunge ease. It does deal directly with death like name. into profound reflection upon the mys- religion and the great tragedies. From New York American, March 5, 2009 tery of pantaloons.” The American ought to say: “This mysterious and inscrutable Chinaman CHESTERTON’S SKETCHBOOK prefers puppy-pie to pumpkin-pie. Let me then ask myself earnestly, in the sight of heaven, why I like pumkin-pie.” It does not follow that the critic will not still have to criticize. I myself, though a mere Englishman, should still prefer to partake of pumpkin rather than puppy. But the pumpkin, if not the puppy, would be put in its right place; both would be subjected to an equal criticism, and the Chinaman would have some fair play. Thus, for instance, I myself dislike much of the new slang and slipshod language; but we must not be slipshod in condemning the slipshod. We must criticize the old as well as the new, and understand exactly what is being supplanted. Courtesy of the Kelly Library, Some Americans, as well as several University of St. Michael’s, Ottawa Europeans, have made game of the men who are now called Morticians; whom we always called Undertakers. They may

32 Volume 21 Number 4, March/April 2018 The Chesterton Review the journal of the G. K. Chesterton Institute for Faith & Culture Founded in 1974

“There really is nothing like The Chesterton Review and i there eer as it eisted in a bygone olden ge o ornals and againes. They hoeer are all dead. The Review abides.” —hili enkins Chronicles againe ne

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The Test of the Imagination Come to Orlando, Florida, for the THAmerican Chesterton 37 Society Conference ar-off lands. Wonder. Magic. Philosophy. These are just a few things present in “The Ethics of Elfland”—and at this year’s F Chesterton conference. SPEAKERS such as Australian Chesterton Society President Karl Schmude, bestselling author Brandon Vogt, and history professor Susan Hanssen will cover topics such as Chesterton and Mary Poppins, GKC and the Historical Imagination, Chesterton and Fictional Countries, and Chesterton and the Internet. ACTORS Kevin O’Brien and Dave Treadaway will portray J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis discussing Chesterton’s The WHEN: August 2-4, 2018 Everlasting Man, the book that influenced WHERE: DoubleTree by them both. Hilton Orlando Airport

. . Go to chesterton.org and register today!