Gilbert K. Chesterton Morality Quotations

A strange fanaticism fills our time: the fanatical hatred of morality, especially of Christian morality.

It is shorter to state the things forbidden than the things permitted; precisely because most things are permitted and only a few things forbidden.

It is the main earthly business of a human being to make his home, and the immediate surroundings of his home, as symbolic and significant to his own imagination as he can.

Modern broad-mindedness benefits the rich; and benefits nobody else.

There are some desires that are not desirable.

What we call emancipation is always and of necessity simply the free choice of the soul between one set of limitations and another.

Truth is sacred; and if you tell the truth too often nobody will believe it.

It's not that we don't have enough scoundrels to curse; it's that we don't have enough good men to curse them.

Morality did not begin by one man saying to another, "I will not hit you if you do not hit me"; there is no trace of such a transaction. There IS a trace of both men having said, "We must not hit each other in the holy place.

There'd be a lot less scandal if people didn't idealize sin and pose as sinners.

These are the days when the Christian is expected to praise every creed except his own.

To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it.

We are justified in enforcing good morals, for they belong to all mankind; but we are not justified in enforcing good manners, for good manners always mean our own manners.