The Flying-Ins

A desperate call and news of my own

2010-05-18T12:33:00.000-07:00

Well, now, my friends: the situation is getting pretty lamentable. The last post was on Christmas Eve and it was mine... Come, come, there are so many authors to this blog, and I'm sure all of them could come up with something interesting to post at least once a month. It's summer now: most of us, I am sure, are out of school or will be soon, and ought to be able to contribute at least a little something towards bringing this blog back to life.

On the other hand, here is some news: I have started my own blog! Head on over and check it out, if you like! :)

God bless you all!

The Shop of Ghosts

2009-12-24T07:08:00.001-08:00

Rather a paradoxical title for a post around Christmas, it might seem, but Christmas is rife with paradoxes. The Burning Babe comes in the frost of winter, to thaw the chilled hearts of men; the All-Powerful becomes a defenseless infant; there is no room for the King of Kings at the inn; the Lord of Lords is born in a stable; God becomes Man. There is another paradox to Christmas, however, that Chesterton touched on in one of his "Tremendous Trifles" called "The Shop of
Ghosts."

In this trifle, GKC wanders into a toy shop in the poorer end of Battersea. There, he encounters a dying old man who refuses to accept money for the toys GKC tries to buy--and who turns out to be Father Christmas. In one of those supernatural twists to Chesterton's fiction, other literary figures--Dickens, Richard Steele, Ben Jonson, even Robin Hood--suddenly make an appearance in the toy shop, all questioning why, since he was dying in their time, Father Christmas is still alive. Finally, it is Dickens who discovers the answer to the riddle: Father Christmas has been dying since he was born; but he will never die.

This paradox of Christmas extends to everything about it, including it's traditions. For something so earth-shatteringly powerful, universal, and stirring, Christmas is surprisingly intangible; we experience it almost solely through the richness of living tradition. And the startling fact--the paradox-- is that when we focus too strongly on the traditions, that vivid richness is lost. We can be glad of giving and receiving gifts, but if we forget the reason we are doing so--because the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us--the traditions suddenly become empty, they become blurry, losing shape and form because they have lost purpose. No tradition, no sentiment has any value when separated from priceless Child in the manger. Nostalgia is not a satisfying feeling; it is a hunger and a thirst for something. Memories do not satisfy; they remind.

That is why, as in "The Shop of Ghosts," Christmas is dying, yet cannot die. It's source is eternal, it's traditions temporal--meaning those external traditions, such as Christmas trees and carols and family gatherings. The temporal outward signs are always dying, like a tree dying in winter; yet because the roots are eternal, it is always living again.

In our time, and as Chesterton suggests, always, Christmas is under attack. Nativity scenes are banned in public places; "holiday" and "season" have edged "Christmas" out of the vernacular; anti-Christians struggle to hold on to the external branches of celebration while rejecting the roots, by having "Winter Solstice Celebrations." As Father Christmas says in "The Shop of Ghosts":

"All the new people have left my shop. I cannot understand it. They seem to object to me on such curious and inconsistent sort of grounds, these scientific men, these innovators. They say that I give people superstitions and make them too visionary; they say I give people sausages and make them too coarse. They say my heavenly parts are too heavenly; they say my earthly parts are too earthly; I don't know what they want, I'm sure. How can heavenly things be too heavenly, or earthly things too earthly? How can one be too good, or too jolly?"

He is speaking, of course, of Christmas Traditions. Father Christmas himself is a tradition, indeed, the embodiment of all the traditions; and like all the other traditions, he is dying as the world constantly attempts to cut him off from his roots, his source of life.

All "Christmasses past" are bound into one poignant and powerful memory by the golden thread of tradition; though the externals have sometimes changed, the celebration of Christmas has been much the same since the time of...Robin Hood. The reason for this communion of Christmas traditions, spanning centuries and continents, is that at Christmas, all the earth is drawn round the creche, knowingly or no. That constancy of eternal truth, ever ancient, ever new, is what makes all Christmasses one, for their center is One: the Holy Christ Child. And that is why Christmas cannot die.

Merry Christmas to all!

If you went to the link to read that last Harry Potter-ish thing...

2009-09-28T20:59:00.002-07:00

Here's some more that has little to do with what came before

I'm posting it by itself because it is a subplot that is connected to the plot, but the subplot is finished and the plot is not.

Chesterton Likes Dickens and I don't!

2009-09-28T20:59:00.001-07:00

On WWI

2009-08-02T12:27:00.000-07:00

I read my first Christopher Dawson book over the weekend, 'The Judgement of Nations.'

It's like a scholarly but dry summary of all of Chesterton's essays on WWI, the spirit of Europe, and the League of Nations. Plus information on secularization, religous freedom, and the dangers of Leuthearism.

All you Harry Potter Fans...And I know there's at least one on this blog...

2009-07-26T20:44:00.000-07:00

You Might Like This

It's my attempt to write a story with a plot line somewhat similar to the plot of HP and the sorcerer's stone (as I understand it; I haven't actually read it): a boy is taken from his home to be schooled in the ways of magic, learns the magic (with all the technichal details included), and then uses it to battle evil. I have tried to go as close as possible to what makes HP attractive, while at the same time, get rid of what some people find bothersome: I make the good magic implicitly sacramental and the bad magic explicitly occultic (without dangerous real-world occult details). But I haven't gotten to the technichal details yet, so you can read just for fun...for now.

Tell me what you think. Is it Chestertonian? Is it interesting? Am I totally ruining something you love?

What a Dead Buddhist Spasm looks like

2009-07-25T09:14:00.001-07:00

Sorry I didn't describe better. Here's a "description."

He did not get this idea from me! He made up this thing himself.

Insipred by the daily quote to your left...

2009-07-24T22:14:00.000-07:00

"Buddhism is not a creed, it is a doubt."

Poor Buddhists. When my five-year old hyper-sanguine brother does his hilarious "Dead Buddhist" spasm, they can't even do anything but doubt it.

The Book That Changed Chesterton's Life

2009-06-22T18:17:00.001-07:00

If you are not a Chestertonian, you may be slightly disappointed to discover that the book ominously referred to in the title is no famous work of philosophy or religion. If you are a Chestertonian, then you will hardly be surprised at all to learn that it was simply a fairy tale written for children. Here is what GKC said:

"...In a certain rather special sense I for one can really testify to a book that has made a difference to my whole existence, which helped me to see things in a certain way from the start; a vision of things which even so real a revolution as a change of religious allegiance has substantially only crowned and confirmed. Of all the stories I have read, including even all the novels of the same novelist, it remains the most real, the most realistic, in the exact sense of the phrase the most like life. It is called "The Princess and the Goblin", and is by George MacDonald..."

Upon such a recommendation, I recently undertook to read George Macdonald's fairy tales. I was not halfway through before it became one of my favorite books. Why is it that I had never heard of it, never come across it--I, who have devoured quite a large portion of children's literature in my time? I have rarely been so astonished at a book upon first reading. It was not that it contained anything really unexpected--it was the simple, joyous, adventurous tale I had anticipated, though filled with more wonders and profundity than I had thought. I was astonished, rather, at the fact that this is not as well known as similar children's literature. It was every bit as good as C.S. Lewis' "The Chronicles of Narnia;" in fact, in my eyes, it was even better. (Do not cringe, Narnians. I love Narnia, too.) Unlike Lewis' cheerful philosophical frolics about the existence of "other worlds" and visitors between them, the set up and the plot for "The Princess and the Goblin," is quite simple and therefore quite poetic. The author makes no pretense of throwing his hero and heroine into some strange, new world by a magical passageway or device. He uses the more traditional and common-sense approach of having wild adventure meet them in their own land. Mystical and marvelous things abound--but they are thoroughly suited to the story and the reader is never troubled with annoying questions of "how" or "why." The magic in the stories feels more like the symbolic manifestation of that which already exists in our world than a device to move the plot along.

Having finished the first book, I proceeded to "The Princess and Curdie" and then a separate MacDonald fairy tale, "The Light Princess." It gradually dawned on me that though I have read many novels where magical happenings and grave adventures are thrillingly present throughout, I have never read children's stories that were so profoundly mystical. Everything had a symbolic meaning, and every story had a moral that was there for the perceiving, if one chose to perceive it. I began to notice strong sacramental and even Eucharistic--yes, written by a protestant, but Eucharistic-- tones and themes running through MacDonald's work. I am convinced that George MacDonald was--as our beloved GKC was--a mystic, in the truest sense of the word. I encourage you to find and pick up George MacDonald's stories; and if you have already read some of them, let's open up the discussion!

And now comes the most important part of my post: here is the link for Chesterton's full article on George MacDonald, which I urge you to read if you haven't already.

God bless!
RoseinFaith

Does God Exist?

2009-06-15T10:07:00.000-07:00

2009-05-07T17:01:00.000-07:00

A link to an essay inspired by the ideas from a chapter in a dissertation written by a
fan of Chesterton (how’s that for degrees of separation?!)

click here

And if you want to read the real dissertation, it is

here

You may call her Jen, Dr. Thursday, but I WILL NOT!

How Chesterton saved me from athie...boredom

2009-04-23T15:19:00.001-07:00

> Do not underestimate the power of rhetoric. It does not decide truth and untruth, but it can do many terrible things to them...
>
> A few days ago, a few years of me despising anti-Chestertonality almost went down the drain. No, Obama didn't almost outlaw Chesterton...not quite that bad. Rather, I was assaulted by the power of Niechtchze.
>
> Now, mind you, I wasn't actually reading N. directly, although, for good or ill, I am that foolish. Rather, I was reading what I thought would be a morally 'safe' publication, written by a professor at the Univeristy of Dallas and bought in the Ave Maria University bookstore. The book is not morally safe, but keep in mind that the opposite of "safe" is not necessarily "dangerous."
>
> Entitled 'Placing Aesthetics,' the book investigates the place of art in the thoughts of several prominent thinkers, including Chesterton's antitheses, Schopenhauer and Mr. N. No matter how stupid the main system of thought is, the views specifically on art generally contain a small bit of truth. But in finding this bit of truth, one must sort through all the untruths provided by the thinkers for our amusement. And the thought of Mr. N is nothing if not filled with untruths and amusements.
>
> Actually, amusement is too weak of a word to detail the appeal of N. Chesterton, yes, can separate the thought from the rhetoric and reveal the result as a boring and tedious world-view, but 'Placing Aesthetics' references Chesterton infrequently at best. I had to face the (toned-down) glories of the rhetoric of N., seemingly without GK. Very exciting, almost as exciting as listening to "Nacht" from "Pierriot Lunaire" without the protection of a music theory teacher.
>
> And the boredoms revealed by Chesterton are, at first glance, but a tribute to the glory of the falsehoods. The ultimate hero for N. is one who defies the very absence of God to live a life and try to add meaning to it. Many thrills that the Christian experiences equal and exceed this one, but none are quite like it...or are they?
>
> And as I was bemoaning my sorry state of being enamoured in a seemingly completely unique way of something I could not believe, Chesterton rode to my rescue on Sunday's elephant.
>
> The drama of the N.-type hero consists in the magnitude of the hero's defiance, a defiance in magnitude similar to that of the anarchist Gregory. Sunday answers the drama of Gregory by referring to the sufferings of Christ. Christ, like the sort of hero and like Gregory, is in opposition to God. As the psalmist says: "it pleased Him (God) to crush Him (the Suffering Servant, Jesus) in infirmity." Jesus Christ and the defiant un-theist are both crushed in infirmity because of their defiance of their opposition to infinite realities. Both carry out their actions in defiance of the complete despair that accompanies the absence of God (Jesus felt the absence of God on the Cross). But Jesus also has the Resurrection. Hence, nothing tragically profound is lost by being Christian, and God is gained. From the depths of my attraction toward the thoughts of this atheist, Chesterton provided the hints that transferred the full force of my admiration to the Drama of God.

The Way to Love Anything

2009-03-29T09:46:00.000-07:00

In Chesterton's famous collection of short essays, "Tremendous Trifles," there is one essay entitled "The Advantages of Having One Leg." In it, he makes the astonishing assertion that, to really appreciate something, we have to isolate it, separate it, and learn what it is like to do without it; in his case, he was contemplating the fact that, with one sprained leg, he had only one good foot to stand on; this inconvenience of having only one leg made him truly appreciate the gift of having two, and contemplate what a miraculous thing a leg actually is. He summed this up when he wrote: "The way to love anything is to realize that it may be lost."

I have been contemplating this idea, too, as a mild inconvenience has forced me to go without my glasses for a week. Nearly everyone must have wished at one time or another to step inside a painting, and I have been granted a privilege that approaches quite near to that imagined experience! Because my astigmatism is blessedly mild, the awe-inspiring effect of going without my glasses is to make the world around me take on the softest of watercolor tones and the smoothness of an impressionist pastel. Harsh delineations are blurred and lights emit a fuller glow. The defects of all around me, from flowers to food, from faces to feet, are smoothed and glossed over as if by an invisible hand that removed all displeasing marks from my view. Whoever thought that looking at life through rose-colored glasses was wrong obviously never tried looking at life through no glasses at all.

However, that primary effect has been followed up by a more profound one. Feeling as though I were living in an impressionist painting may give the world beautiful softness; but it has made me realize that I miss those stronger distinctions; seeing words look slightly wobbly on a page makes me miss the strong, dark, straight lines I used to read with my glasses. Perhaps blurred faces might be, to an impressionist's eye, more beautiful than faces whose every flaw and detail was clearly traced; but looking at the blurry faces of my family across the room makes me long for the time when I could see their faces sharpened and clarified through my glasses. I cannot help wishing for a clearer--even if that means harsher--world. It is the distinctions that give all around me shape and form; it is the lines, laws, and boundaries that make my world a detailed and three-dimensional reality, and not a watercolor or pastel painting. The way to love our limits is to realize they may be lost. I realized that this feeling is akin to another I've felt when treated to bad modern theology; absent of all clarity and definitiveness, it ends up leaving only a vague and fuzzy impression--much like a bad impressionist painting. It has no clear shapes, no outline of reality; only splotches of blurry color. The result is not to make me love the bad theology; it makes me love that which is lost: the absent good theology, the very marks of which are clarity and definition.

At the end of "The Advantages of Having One Leg," Chesterton wrote: "This world and all our powers in it are far more awful and beautiful than even we know until some accident reminds us. If you wish to perceive that limitless felicity, limit yourself if only for a moment. If you wish to realise how fearfully and wonderfully God's image is made, stand on one leg. If you want to realise the splendid vision of all visible things--wink the other eye."
Or, I might suggest, take off your glasses.

Chestertonality at Chicago Midway

2009-03-22T14:08:00.001-07:00

This time I am the flying-inner. No, I haven’t been drinking, or selling
drinks; I just got back from a plane trip to Florida to see Ave Maria
University. (You might see an article on Distributism and Ave Maria later, you
might not.) No, I did not see Joseph Pearce, or Fr. Fessio, although I did see
Tom Monahan. One of you needs to go there and start a Chesterton society.
But the most strikingly Chestertonain thing I saw (besides a copy of one volume
of the Complete Works of Chesterton that I brought with me) was actually in
Chicago Midway airport. In the interest of diversity, someone had put up a
poster exhibiting common elements of human culture from around the world:
eating, children, and something else (the commas are important). And, to my
temporal shame, my first reaction was, well, incomplete.
You see, the one picture that really caught my eye was of two children in
Bosnia, a boy and a girl. The boy was holding a toy machine gun, and the girl
was standing next to him. Both were in front of a stone wall that had a hole in
it.
Naturally but unfortunately, my first reaction was one of pity: pity for the
fact that for these children, this is somewhat real: they may very well have
seen or known someone who was killed in just such a manner. Is the boy hating
his pretended enemies? Is he scarred for life?
But I don’t think Chesterton would worry, at least not about the hate element.
The key is the girl. What is more natural, childlike, and Chestertonian than
for a prince to defend his princess? For the American child, playing at knights
and princesses may be a wholesome exercise, but it is a pretend one. For the
Bosnian children, playing at knights and princesses is real and even necessary,
yet no less romantic for being so. It is right to pity the sorry state of
Bosnia and the effect it may have on the children, but this sorry state makes
the actions depicted in the picture all the more important.

Commentary Concerning Musuems

2009-03-04T07:24:00.000-08:00

In the latest Gilbert! Magazine, Fr. James Schall, S.J. has an excellent article on the modern institution of the musuem. Apparently, Chesterton disliked musuems. The article left me wondering why I do like them, and whether my liking is a good thing.

But first, Gilbert's reasons for dislike.

Chesterton classifies two types of sightseers. First is the accidental sight-seer, who sees a sight while going about his daily business, and the sight surprises him with what he did not know before and was not expecting to learn. This is a good sort of sight-seer because the sight effects him in a good way by way of surprise. Second is the type of sightseer called a pilgrim, the sort of person who goes to a place of pilgrimage with the deliberate purpose of seeing what they know to be there. This sort of person is good because they become holier and/or satisfy a good human desire. But a musuem, says Chesterton/Fr. Schall, is not for either of these sorts of people. Rather, this overstuffed institution is for specialists and for people who go there to learn philosophically disconnected bits of more or less useless and unedifying information.

Frankly, I was troubled. I LOVE going to musuems. Is something wrong with me? Chesterton says that when we dislike something, we ought to investigate our reasons for the dislike; that is what he does in the essay Fr. Shcall refers to. After reading Fr. Schall's essay, however, I am wondering whether I ought to investigate the reasons I like something. Antifreeze tastes good just like sugar, you know.

One thing was quite cosoling to me. I do not go to musuems as a specialist. When I was in Dallas, I went to a musuem of Oriental art, not because I am a specialist in Oriental art (though I daresay I might know more than many other Americans), but because I like it. And I daresay that I have never gone to a musuem just to learn about something about which I already knew a great deal; I always went because I wanted to.

But neither have I gone and been philosophically disconnected. Although the musuems may not provide the connections, in a way, it is appropriate that they do not. By the very fact that the connections are not provided, one is much freer to MUSE upon those very connections or lack thereof, provided they are even aware that the notion of philosophical connectedness exists. In the very hell-heart of philosophical disconnectedness, a Modern Art musuem, the muse is at work, forcing us to ponder what we can guess about the philosophical beliefs (or again, the lack thereof) of the artist. If all else fails, one can say "Ultimately, God made that, and that, and that and that and..." and come away better than they went in. Going to a musuem to contemplate...that sounds just like a pilgrim.

But in fact, I think that my personal style of purposefully also includes the method of the surprised traveller. In no place other than a musuem (and this is brought out wonderfully in "Night in the Musuem") can you EXPECT A SURPRISE. One goes to a musuem expecting to learn an "I know not what," whether it be that Catholic Priests appear in Mideval Japanese art, or that Evolution is a good story, regardless of whether or not it is true, or that the Musuem of Modern Art in DC serves the best ice cream in the world.

Let us not lament the existence of musuems; let us lament those who use them improperly.

GK’s “What’s Wrong with the World” as a work of Anti-Utopian Literature

2009-03-02T07:13:00.000-08:00

Whether or not Anti-Utopian Literature is a literary category in itself is a matter of debate. With the works of Chesterton, it probably doesn’t matter anyway. It’s the anti-utopian ideas within it that are of interest.
This may come as somewhat of a surprise. After all, doesn’t the very title imply that Chesterton wants a better world? But Chesterton’s ideal world is anything but a utopia, and the ideas of his ideal world are anything but similar to the utopian ideas of others. I’ll be using ‘The Republic’ for most of my examples because “What’s Wrong With the World” specifically countered some of its concerns for me that I could not answer.
With unexpected efficiency (because we ought not expect that what’s actually wrong with the world is a method just as much as a thing or condition), Chesterton outlines the method of dealing with social problems that has caused yet worse social problems: that people prescribe cures for social evils without considering that others in the world might not agree that the result is desirable. The perennial example (I don’t remember if Chesterton actually uses it) is the teetotaler (of course): there is less question that making alcohol illegal under Sharia law will reduce drunkenness than there is that eliminating both alcohol and drunkenness from the human condition is a good thing.
And this is exactly the first error of utopians. In their utopias, both Marx and Plato wish to make a perfect world through changing human nature: Marx by placing humans in a questionably effective economic environment, Plato by a state-sponsored system of ideal education (Plato’s world is not perfect, even according to him, as he admitted it would fall into decay, though through questionable methods, but he did see it as an improvement over what the Greeks had at the time). This is exactly what Chesterton denies; he wants to describe a better society for humans as they are, with full attention given to Original Sin, the relationships between the sexes (even the culturally determined ones), and the good-but-dangerous inclinations of humanity.
In the question of the roles of the sexes (the one I could not answer), Chesterton in fact provides an answer to Plato’s most difficult false thesis: that women should be given exactly what they have aptitude for, even if their aptitudes are manly. Chesterton answers (without specifically referring to Plato, by the way), that even if this is a good, it destroys two goods, men and women, two elements of human nature. It destroys men by destroying comradeship (a specifically male form of friendship with these five qualities: equality among those concerned, an impersonal treatment of the others, a ’were all in this together’ attitude, competition (whether verbal or non-verbal), and bad, bold, physically dirty manners) because women can neither be comrades nor do they generally even permit it among men if they can help it. It destroys women by destroying their broadmindedness (their ability, within the home only, to do and think and answer childish questions about everything, rather than one specialization), their dignity (which is there terrible and impressive atmosphere of cold modesty: “But when men wish to be safely impressive, as judges, priests or kings, they do wear skirts, the long, trailing robes of female dignity The whole world is under petticoat government; for even men wear petticoats when they wish to govern.”), their freedom (for if they act like men, they will do it, and their former housework, with an enslaving conscientiousness), and their protection from the evil of politics known as punishment of criminals.
Plato is in many other ways opposed to Chesterton in the way described above, for he constantly ignores the good he would destroy by removing an evil that is opposed to his utopia. Removing all musical modes except the Dorian and Phrigian might destroy drunkenness, but it would also destroy drinking-songs. Taking the children to view the battles might destroy their fear, but it would also destroy their innocence. Living in common might destroy selfishness, but it would also destroy a man’s right to be king and knight-errant in his own home. Making government more efficient might destroy inefficiency, but it would also destroy democracy.
We know what Chesterton would say about all these objections to utopia. The fact that Plato does not address them, and that Marx’s addressing of them are at best insufficient points to the fact that the non-ideal state of Chesterton is the superior state.

Recommendation

2009-02-16T07:30:00.001-08:00

Currently, I'm on a Father Brown audiobook binge. The Innocence of Father Brown, read by Kevin O'Brien, is really good...especially the description of the frightful Gaelic imagination in 'The Secret Garden.'

The advantages of being Unfamous

2009-02-11T15:09:00.000-08:00

It might interest you to know that my G.K. Chesterton related posters are not being refused by the people in charge of posters at this sickeningly tolerant public university. Perhaps it's because all the indoctrinated people have no clue who Chesterton is.

Hello !!

2009-01-31T10:17:00.000-08:00

I’m so sorry to have neglected the blog for such a long time. Shame on me! I promise it won’t happen again. I see there’s been a contest going on, and I’ve missed it! Well, I must say the essays I’ve read are certainly good. But now, let me introduce myself to our new blog:

My name is María Paz (hence Mapaz), and I’m an eighteen-years-old girl from the Spanish and Castilian city of Valladolid. I’m now studying Law at the University of Valladolid, but I don’t think I’ll ever want to become a lawyer. A diplomat, at any rate, or a crazy scientist, if that doesn’t work out, or whatever God plans. One can never tell.

Reading is one of the many hobbies I have. Among my favorite writers you can find Evelyn Waugh, P.G. Wodehouse, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Belloc, Oscar Wilde, Jane Austen, Miguel Mihura, Ionesco, Baring, Stevenson, Kipling, Álvaro Cunqueiro, Borges, Joseph Conrad… and, of course, G.K. Chesterton. Some of these writers are really funny; others have a beautiful way of telling stories. Chesterton does both, and besides, he’s my favorite writer.

I was first introduced to G.K., as many of you, through his Father Brown stories. I was about 9 or 10 years old, and I read them as a child reads an adventure novel. I’ve read them again since then, but now I realize that life should be an adventure and we should be like children, something I may have known intuitively before, but had completely forgotten. So in my teenage years, some time after my first encounter with Chesterton’s books had taken place, I re-discovered his work (his essays, Manalive, Orthodoxy, The Everlasting Man…) and found it incredibly helpful to understand everything better: my faith, friendship, adventure, holiness, the importance of family, the romance of orthodoxy, the world…

Chesterton has taught me about humbleness and about the joy of being alive. Whenever I feel down, whenever I miss my bus and have to run with admirable dexterity among people that willfully obstruct any pedestrian movement, only to find out I’ve also missed the next bus, and when I feel, like Mark Twain, it was a pity that Noah and his party did not miss the boat, I suddenly remember that an inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered and that existence is the most rare of gifts. And what makes Chesterton even more special is that, it’s not only through his books that he shows us a way to holiness, but also through the example of his own life.

These, my friends, are some of the things I owe to Chesterton, but I must also mention the possibility of having met other people that, as me, admire him so much. Now, please forgive my English and may you have a good weekend!

Our Note-Book Contest, Part II

2009-01-25T20:30:00.001-08:00

“You are fire and ice,
The touch of you burns my hands like snow.”

--Amy Lowell, “The Opal”

Although these verses definitely express the feelings of the small boy, featured in the Omaha World-Herald, who stuck his tongue to the lamp-post, they definitely do not express the emotions of those who observe him. There is no paradox or dichotomy in our emotions, we either think the action definite foolishness or definite wisdom, but neither both nor somewhere in between. For foolishness can be wisdom, but not quite foolishness and not quite wisdom definitely is not wisdom, though it might be foolishness.
Conceivably, there might be some persons who would call the sticking the tongue to the lamp-post wisdom, such as those lazy artistic sadistic philchaosophers who would make money by exhibiting in the Guggenheim frozen mouthlar muscle torn from the tongue by the artistic medium itself. That would be the ultimate way for the artist to have no control over the art, even more so than the infamous 4’33”, but that is a topic for another day and a different blog. Those who style themselves as more saintly or strong persons might also approve of the action, for just as saints and strong men flagellate the outsides of their body literally and metaphorically (and note that it is the saints that do it literally), why should not the ordinary person flagellate the inside (or the outside, as the mouth, like a door, is both) of their body? If I were to believe this, I suppose I should also ask my tongue to run like it was a leg, or, if I were a bishop, to ask everyone to be a priest, and everyone to be a mother, and everyone to…get the picture?
But besides the fact that the tongue is not a back and is not made to be whipped cream (those who think it is must be confusing “eat” with “is” and thus would say that a carrot eats a carrot, or that a diamond eats hard, or that the tongue is whipped cream), there is another reason that one should not, even in the name of strength or holiness, treat a bar of frozen metal like a bar of frozen chocolate, namely, that the exercise does not strengthen and the mortification does not mortify.
The experiment of changing agua de lengua to agua de connecion with the result that one finds frozen blood on one’s back the next time one leans up a against the nearest object while waiting for the bus can only be done for one type of strength: strength of the will, a commodity much desired by Napoleonists, Niechtzcheians, Prussians, and even the opposite of all three, convention-crashing-Chestertonians. We all that it seems like a way to make the will stronger.
But there is something to this daring deed that makes it peculiar: it is practically useless to try to do the deed with proper motive, the motive of strengthening the will, without falling into the traps of unwisdom. For it is the peculiar thing about the deed that if one contemplates the action for any significant length of time, it does one of two things. It begins to fascinate them; they could be seized with a desire to taste its madness, to, (if I may plagarize) put on the ring on in front of the ringwraith; or it presents itself as a completely unwise course of action, one that , though it strengthens the will, would leave doer better off doing something like their tongue to a frozen confection, or going to New York and walking on stilts instead of legs. In this case, there is either no good to be gained by doing the action (for a harmless action could strengthen the will just as much), or the only good to be gained is that of peace from a devouring passion, a good that does not strengthen the will when it is gained. One could become addicted to winter self-sadism, and either have to go to the asylum every spring or end up deliberately skiing into a tree.
A change of motive, even less than a change of season, does not solve the problem. Every true mortification is done for purposes of holiness, and to prevent pride, gigantesque mortifications can be indulged in only under obedience. And any priest who would allow his directee to torture their tongue would be better off letting them flagellate their feet. At least they can gain a second penance by walking on the feet, but one cannot taste even things as unpleasant as the stews of Rohan with the absent taste=buds of an ice-burned tongue.

Our Note-Book Contest

2009-01-22T12:38:00.000-08:00

Let This Be A Lesson

In a mood of general despondency about the state of the press in our modern day, an acquaintance recently brought to my attention an article that, he protested, was proof of the "silly" side of the media. He had come across an article entitled "Let this be a lesson to all you six-year-olds" about a boy who repeated the infamous procedure of sticking his tongue to a cold steel lamp post in mid-winter. It was, of course, immediately stuck fast, frozen to the steel post; and despite my pity for the child, I confess I felt a general tendency to share my friend's meager view of the press, if it found such trivial incidents newsworthy--until it occurred to me that it was not so trivial at all.

In fact, upon reflection, it occurred to me that, though perhaps the incident really should not have ended up in the newspaper, the reporter had actually pointed the story in the right direction, whether by purpose or no, and revealed something rather interesting. The point of the article was not that the poor lad got his tongue stuck to a lamp post; the point of the article, if only jestingly, was that his misfortunate action should serve as a lesson to other children; that with blazing firmness, the case of this young daredevil may be permanently imprinted on the minds of his peers, that they may never venture the risky maneuver of sticking tongues to lamp posts in winter themselves.

Perhaps there was a sort of "tongue in cheek"--if you will pardon the pun-- attitude about the way the article was written; the title, "Let this be a lesson..." was meant to evoke amused shakings-of-the-head from adults. But that is why adults miss the point of the story. The little kindergartener in the article would never attempt such a move again, or even consider it. He learned his lesson; he learned it in the cruel school of experience. Adults like the author of the article really expect other children to learn from this; to know better than to attempt it themselves. While they cannot guarantee that this will be the effect on other children, at least the lesson is there for the learning. Other children may yet have to learn this lesson the hard way--but if they do, they will learn it well.

That is, in a nutshell, the difference between the adult approach to such experiences and a child's approach. When children learn a lesson the hard way, they do not, as a principle, forget it. It stays with them. Adults tend to outgrow this sincerity of conscience, and repeat again the mistakes whose lessons they should have learned already; it may have something to do with the fact that adults lack the humility of children in recognizing what they did wrong, and that they ought not to do it again.

This discrepancy, of adults failing to learn lessons as children do, is brought to me with greater force as I observe repeatedly the manifestation of that age-old adage: "History repeats itself." An unusually strong and charismatic president led the nation into World War I. At the end of World War I, politicians predicted world peace and prosperity, practically guaranteed through the newly formed League of Nations. Through the influence of an unusually strong and charismatic president, the nation entered World War II. After World War II, world leaders were again predicting peace, practically guaranteed through the newly formed United Nations. Needless to say, that peace did not last very long, either.

The pattern is seen even in a contemporary parallel. In the 1920's, when materialism was all the rage in American society, leaders were predicting immediate, constant, and widespread prosperity ("a chicken in every pot and two cars in every garage!"). Then, through shaky economic policies, massive inflation, too much trust in the system and downright bad choices, the U.S. ushered in a world-wide Great Depression. Ten years ago, with materialism again on the rise, life-long prosperity seemed undoubtedly in our grasp. Now, through all the bad choices mentioned above repeated again, we seem to be on the brink of a Second Greater Depression.

It is possible that this is one reason why Christ told us to become like little children, and why little children should be the model for humanity. Humanity should learn its lessons as children do, and should accept them with finality. All our dark sins and sad mistakes are repeated through this general failing to learn our lessons. If, upon entering the confessional, I say "Bless me, Father, for I have sinned..." and repeat the same sins that I committed last time, I can optimistically say that I have, at least, not added any new ones; but the truth is, that I have not learned my lesson. In my un-childlike pride, I have failed to take to heart the realization of the damage sin has done to my soul, and so I have repeated it. Even if, by my human weakness, I fall again into these sins, I must at least have a "firm purpose of amendment," an active intention to eradicate those sins from my activities.

Young adults can be particularly prone to the temptation to ignore or not to learn lessons, though by far they are not the only class subject to this temptation. Young and old have clashed again and again through history, generally because the young have failed to learn the lessons of their fathers. In believing themselves to be adults, on their own independent ground, youths can be tempted to cast aside the lessons their fathers learned before them. Consequently, new generations frequently repeat the mistakes of their predecessors, and the result is the Neo-Puritans and Neo-Pagans that have arisen in our day. It is time for young adults to recognize that the lessons of the past are better preparation for the future than inexperience. We must drink deeply of the lessons of our fathers, that we may learn better the lessons of our own experience, and pass them on, rich and full, to the next generation. We must learn to learn our lessons with the simplicity of children; if we are burnt, we dare not touch the fire; if we stick our tongues to a cold steel post, we ought to know better than to ever do so again.

A Challenge

2009-01-18T06:51:00.000-08:00

Based on a recent post by our good colleague Old Fashioned Liberal, I thought it might be fun to challenge everyone to an essay contest. The idea would be to try to write a "Chestertonian" essay as if GKC were writing his weekly essay for "Our Note-Book" in the Illustrated London News (or as we call it, ILN). It would be limited to 1500 words (as his were), and you would have one week to write it - which was the usual time interval between his essays. (Note: you would not have to abide by his usual average of 14.2 semicolons, though that would be a fitting gesture; his average word count was 1459.5, and his average paragraph count was 5.6; he wrote 1533 essays between 1905 and 1936.)

The topic would be that suggested by the very curious post by OFL, about a child who got his tongue stuck to a lamppost.

Please note: if you have not yet read any of GKC's ILN essays, you might wish to do so before entering. (There are a number of volumes of these, available through the ACS; also, some collections of his essays such as All Things Considered and Generally Speaking are drawn almost exclusively from his ILN columns.) Many times he began with a recent item of news, be it odd or commonplace - but in his usual style he connected it with far-flung topics from literature or politics or history or religion, seasoned with deep philosophy and stirred by profound thought. And, I surmise, much prayer and sighs, awaiting the whisper from the Holy Spirit... as he waddled down the stairs, pausing on each landing to scribble out the next essay - while at the door the courier waited anxiously for him to submit this week's effort and Frances called "Gilbert! He's waiting for your next 'Note-Book'!" Oh my.

So, if you wish, please ponder the topic - you need not get the precise details from the specific paper OFL mentions; GKC would not worry about that either. A simple allusion will suffice: "The other day I read how a child stuck his tongue to a cold steel lamppost..." (Such a fertile topic, it suggests many things even to me.)

Since I propose the contest, I am willing to act as judge (if you agree); I am sure there is some curious book or something lying around here which can be used as a prize. But do read some ILN essays, and see how unique they are - then see if you would like to try it for yourself. If not, maybe make a ballade... it's certainly an apt topic. (I might try that myself. No ballades are being accepted for this contest, though.)

In order to enter, please post it with the title "Our Note-Book Contest"; you can assign your own "essay" title in the body of the posting. If you are not a member and wish to enter, please email me your entry (see my profile for my e-address) and I will post it for you.

A proper introduction.

2009-01-17T21:45:00.000-08:00

In keeping with the request that all the incoming blog members introduce themselves, I stand here metaphorically (in what Dr. Thursday has termed the E-Cosmos) and curtsy in greeting. I'm afraid I can't hope to match Claire's post for grace, eloquence, and insight, but I shall present myself as best I can.

My name, so far as it concerns this blog, is "RoseinFaith." It is not, of course, my real name, but bear in mind it is not because of any negative impressions I could have of you (which I don't) that I don't publish my name here; it is, of course, just a safety precaution in the world wide web, where many, many people can--and I hope, will--access and read the Flying-Ins.

I became acquainted with Chesterton years ago by what, at the time, seemed merely coincidental circumstances. When I was not yet out of grade school, and was lapping up works of literature with great relish, someone gave me an old book she had bought at a used book sale: a worn, Catholic Authors Press edition, printed probably in the 1950's or earlier, of G.K. Chesterton's The Ballad of the White Horse. It was dog-eared, eaten a bit by moths; the pages were yellowed, and mildewed in spots; and it had clearly passed through the hands of several different school children, one of whom had taken the liberty of drawing Viking weapons on the pages in various places. Besides these pencil drawings (which I never had the heart or the desire to erase), it was illustrated beautifully, with a rousing picture on the front of trimphant Alfred rallying his men, his sword held high, and the Danes, in horned helmets, recoiling back with expressions of sheer disbelief and surprise. In the bottom left hand corner of the front cover, next to the title, was an illustration of Chesterton himself. (Incidentally, his tiny pince-nez, unruly hair, and jolly expression fascinated me even before I knew much about him; so much, in fact, that I took up a pencil to try to copy the cover illustration--not of Alfred, but of Chesterton.) Even though I now have the Ignatius Press version as well, the yellowed old book is still my favorite edition.

I was too young to understand all of this masterpiece then, but his vibrantly beautiful poetry, his intense, symbolic style of story-telling, and his high ideals captured my imagination. Such was my introduction to Chesterton. Through the years, I became more acquainted with his work (principally through EWTN'S Apostle of Common Sense), and upon discovering that he seemed to be right about everything and was able to express himself better than any other Catholic authors I could think of, I became a Chesterton devotee and, more recently, a member of the American Chesterton Society.

Unfortunately, I am not among those who can boast of having read all of Chesterton's famous books. That is a goal towards which I am still working; I have, however, marked quite a few off the list. Still, The Ballad of the White Horse remains one of my favorites of his writings, if not the favorite. I feel indebted to the book for two reasons; through his ballad, Chesterton introduced me to two aspects of life and my Catholic faith with which I was yet rather unacquainted. The first was the Common Man; the second, was the idea and ideal of Christendom. These two have strengthened in me through other Catholic authors and through further reading of Chesterton, but I feel I can date my real introduction to them to that first reading of the Ballad.

Before my acquaintance with Chesterton, I failed to look at many people around me with interest; or rather, I failed to see how they were more interesting than many things that occupied my interest. I loved book characters, the heroes and heroines in novels, and in older movies, but I did not see their real-life counterparts in the checkout lady and the termite-exterminator. Through King Alfred--especially through the famous section on the cakes and Humility--I began to see the reality of common people being good people, of humility being powerful. The reader meets Alfred as a King who has failed; the Danes have overrun his beloved country and he is brought to his knees on the little isle of Athelney. In the end, he does not win by his own power, but by God's grace. Because he is a common man, he is an uncommon king, an ideal king. All through the book, as I read it the first time, I felt impressed upon me the inherent goodness and beauty of many everyday people and things, which Chesterton so loved and respected. I could, of course, go on for much longer than a paragraph about this; but the end result was that I began to look at that checkout lady and termite-exterminator, and the "faces in the street," and began to realize that they were fascinating; they had families, personalities, stories; they were interesting, not as specimens or unusual cases, but as my brothers and sisters in Christ.

Most especially, I feel a debt of gratitude to Chesterton for opening my eyes to the great Catholic ideal of Christendom--of a kingdom united under Christ, exceeding all boundaries, the idea of Christianity itself being a world. I needn't tell you what The Ballad of the White Horse has to do with Christendom; if you don't know, you must read the ballad as soon as you can. I have found few authors that so beautifully grasped and so clearly related the profundity of "Christendom" as Chesterton has. His verses on it, when I re-read them, have me exclaiming joyfully again within myself: "Yes! It's true!"

Then again, I find myself saying that whenever I pick up Chesterton.

God Bless!
RoseinFaith

Welcome to the Silly Season

2009-01-16T08:09:00.000-08:00

Today, I saw a headline in the Omaha World-Herald that read "Let this be a lesson to all you 6-year olds." The article was about a child who stuck his tongue to a lamp-post on purpose. Why are our newspapers printing this inconsequentialism?

Chesterton provides an answer. Somewhere (I can't remember where), he speaks of the "Silly Season" the time of year between political campaigns. Journalists, he says, call it the silly season because there is nothing to write about, so they turn to less-covered subjects. But it is the journalists who are the silly ones, Chesterton argues, for this is the time when they are actually freest to write about the issues that really matter: things like whether or not Christianity is winning or losing the culture war and what we can do about it.

Whoever wrote the tongue article was wasting their time. Let's hope they are not Chestertonain yet.

2009-01-13T12:08:00.000-08:00

When asked to introduce myself I'm never quite sure what I ought to say, so I generally stick to the basics, which I'll do in this case. I'd like to be clever, but I just woke up from a nap and am still dreadfully tired, so I'll have to be conventional. :)

My name is Clare; I'm a cradle Catholic of Irish, Scottish, English, Dutch, and Danish descent; and I'm a little over a month shy of nineteen years old. I have six brothers, all of whom I am very fond. I was homeschooled throughout, and graduated from high school last spring. This coming fall I'll follow in the footsteps of my oldest brother and begin attending Thomas Aquinas College in Santa Paula, CA.

I never got over my childhood interest in everything, and wish I had the time to study everything that intrigues me. One of my greatest passions is music: I've taken violin lessons for about five years, I've taught myself the classical guitar, I can play a little piano, and know the basic theory of the organ though I wasn't able to keep up lessons. Language is another chief interest of mine, and I'm actively learning Latin, German, and Spanish, and actively searching for a good French course. I'm fond of singing, dancing, reading, writing, sewing, debating, and tea. My latest hobby is snowboarding, which I am decidedly not in the least good at, but I work at it... as long as I'm going down and on my feet all is well.

G.K. Chesterton has always been present in my life, more or less. Long before I was familiar with his writing I was familiar with his name. My father collects Chesterton first-editions and whatnot, and as a child I often admired the autographed picture of the man on the wall, which was hung just next to a framed original of one of his poems. In a bookshelf close by were several beautiful and very old books, sometimes bearing that same signature, and there were also little odds-and-ends tucked away here and there: for instance, a little menu in French, with that very same signature; and a note from a Mrs. Frances Chesterton, thanking the recipient for the condolences on her husband's death.

And so there was Chesterton, from the very beginning. Eventually I did get familiar with some his work, when my father read several of the Father Brown stories aloud. And shortly before I entered my teenage years I read the collection for myself. I was, as they say, hooked, and I read Heretics immediately following, which is still one of my favourite of his works.

So here's a classic and rather sappy statement, but I mean it very genuinely: Chesterton changed my life. He not only taught me about truth, but he taught me about joy and beauty and wonder. He caught me just as I was leaving childhood and convinced me that I didn't need to leave fairyland. He taught me that the Faith was true, and I've never doubted it since. He taught me that the Faith was joy, and I've safely avoided those that would say that wine, laughter, and merriness are un-Catholic things. He taught me that the Faith was glorious and courageous, and I've found that I have a new strength and resolve to carry on to the end. He taught me too the extraordinary wonder of being alive, and this wonder has helped me through all my dark hours.

I read his works, imitate his great example of Catholicism, live both life and the Faith to the fullest, and look forward to the day when I can at least meet my great hero in eternity.

Introduction

2009-01-12T12:37:00.000-08:00

I: "Dear Reader, meet Old Fashioned Liberal. Old Fashioned Liberal, meet Dear Reader."
DR: "Oh, an Old Fashioned Liberal. Do I fear you, like you, or think that everything you say is both old and false?"
OFL: "None of the above. Treat me like you would anything else. If what I say is true, think so. If what I say is false, say so."
DR: "How did you get interested in Chesterton?"
OFL: "It was Orthodoxy. It had the potential of being the best book in the world, so I read it. I was not disappointed and so came back for more. How about you?"
DR: "_________________________"

Well, Dear Reader, fill in the blank

2009-01-08T11:30:00.000-08:00

Greetings!

I go, as you see, by the name "helenamarie" after my confirmation saint, St. Helena. Like many Chestertonians, I first meet GKC through his famed detective, Fr. Brown. I have since read Lepanto and Orthodoxy and attended the 2008 GKC conference (which was really fabulous).

A Welcome From the Doctor

2009-01-07T13:09:00.000-08:00

Yes, this is Dr. Thursday, honoured to join in yet another grand Chestertonian club, committee and concert out here in the E-cosmos! Or should that be "in" here? You know that's what GKC called it... see Maisie Ward's quote from his "Notebook" in her biography, page 61, when he wrote up his grand invitation for his Christmas party:

My great ambition is to give a party at which everybody should meet everybody else and like them very much.

AN INVITATION
Mr. Gilbert Chesterton
requests the pleasure
Of humanity's company
to tea on Dec. 25th 1896.
Humanity Esq., The Earth, Cosmos E.

Oh, yes.

Our esteemed blogg-mistress asks us to introduce ourselves. It is a bit difficult for me to say very much just now, as I have said so very much elsewhere, such as on the ACS blogg or on my own blogg (which is named for our dear Aunt Frances (Blogg) Chesterton, GKC's favourite blogg!) or those fictional and non-fictional bloggs of mine for which you can find links there. I have known of GKC from when I was quite young, having heard my father recite "Lepanto", and since sometime in the mid-1980s have read just about every scrap of GKC's writing I could find. Besides doing computer stuff and knowing a little about biology (I can spell DNA. See?) and having collected a variety of GKC's works into what I call the AMBER collection, and spoken at an ACS Conference or three, there's not much more to tell. Except perhaps that I am a strong proponent of the canonization of Aunt Frances and Uncle Gilbert. Ahem. (Really, I'm kind of boring otherwise. But I do like to laugh. Ask Ria; she knows.)

So. Ahem-squared. The natural thing for me to do in cases like this is to see where "Flying In" might appear within GKC's writing. (That's not "Inn" with two N's, you understand, that's something quite different, and you can find that in a book by GKC. It's a wheelbarrow, a wheel of cheese, a keg of rum, a big dog named Quoodle, and some crazy men...) This is not easy to do, since the usual finite automata recognizers will match both kinds of "in/inn" unless you ask nicely. Huh? You know how most magic won't work unless it's in Latin or it rhymes? Yes, they're like that. Hee hee. But I am a bit more than a finite machine, at least if I'm half-awake, and I even know how to make them work. (If you are wondering, these are the simplest kind of computer, and all computers of course are finite; this makes some people happy and others sad, but I cannot talk about that here and now.)

As usual when one plays with AMBER, one finds the most remarkable quotes side by side, which is as wonderful as an encyclopedia, about which GKC said this:

...it is the test of a good encyclopaedia that it does two rather different things at once. The man consulting it finds the thing he wants; he also finds how many thousand things there are that he does not want.
[GKC The Common Man]

That dictum ought to assist us in our efforts to write this blogg.

Ahem. Let us, then, proceed to see some of the remarkable places where GKC uses "flying in":

"Mr. Wells is trying to kill two birds with one stone, though the birds are flying in opposite directions: one being the white dove of an eternal hope and the other the black raven of despair."
[GKC, Where All Roads Lead CW3:57]

For my own part, I do not like this flying in the face of Mr. Chamberlain. Mr. Chamberlain has chosen to wear one flower; why should Lord Meath try forcibly to tie him to another? Mr. Chamberlain has selected the orchid, which is surely a very good
symbol of modern Imperialism. It is very expensive, like the mines in South Africa. It is of hybrid origin, like the people who own them. It is commonly of a very queer colour. It is a parasite. I do not see what is the matter with the orchid.
[ILN June 8 1907 CW27:480]

"Sure!" said Mr. Enoch Oates, nodding. "And my purpose was about the biggest thing in fancy goods ever done in the States. In the publicity line there's nothing like saying you can do what folks say can't be done. Flying in the face of proverbs instead of providence, I reckon. It catches on at once. We got to work, and got out the first advertisement in no time; just a blank space with: 'We Can Do It' in the middle. Got folks wondering for a week what it was."
[GKC Tales of the Long Bow, chapter 5: "The Exclusive Luxury Of Enoch Oates"]

The men in the motor-car looked anxiously in the direction of his dreamy gaze, and they saw that the whole regiment at the end of the road was advancing upon them, Dr. Renard marching furiously in front, his beard flying in the breeze.
[GKC The Man Who Was Thursday CW6:598]

In the next year appeared Ferishtah's Fancies, which exhibit some of his shrewdest cosmic sagacity, expressed in some of his quaintest and most characteristic images. Here perhaps more than anywhere else we see that supreme peculiarity of Browning - his sense of the symbolism of material trifles. Enormous problems, and yet more enormous answers, about pain, prayer, destiny, liberty, and conscience are suggested by cherries, by the sun, by a melon-seller, by an eagle flying in the sky, by a man tilling a plot of ground. It is this spirit of grotesque allegory which really characterizes Browning among all other poets. Other poets might possibly have hit upon the same philosophical idea - some idea as deep, as delicate, and as spiritual. But it may be safely asserted that no other poet having thought of a deep, delicate, and spiritual idea would call it "A Bean Stripe; also Apple Eating."
[GKC Browning]

For my last-but-one, I shall quote the remarkable appearance of "flying in" within The Flying Inn:

'This aesthetic way we have, Hump, has only two little disadvantages which I will now explain to you. The first is exactly what has sent us flying in this contraption. When the beautiful, smooth, harmonious thing you've made is worked by a new type, in a new spirit, then I tell you it would be better for you a thousand times to be living under the thousand paper constitutions of Condorcet and Sieyès. When the English oligarchy is run by an Englishman who hasn't got an English mind - then you have Lord Ivywood and all this nightmare, of which God could only guess the end."
[GKC The Flying Inn, "The Songs of the Car Club"]

So very suitable. for us. But I think this last one is perhaps the best, and I shall give it in its entirety - if I were an artist, I might try to draw this. Certainly I imagine our Uncle Gilbert adding a sketch to it. It is his poem called:

"The Fish"

Dark the sea was: but I saw him,
One great head with goggle eyes,
Like a diabolic cherub
Flying in those fallen skies.

I have heard the hoarse deniers,
I have known the wordy wars;
I have seen a man, by shouting,
Seek to orphan all the stars.

I have seen a fool half-fashioned
Borrow from the heavens a tongue,
So to curse them more at leisure -
- And I trod him not as dung.

For I saw that tinny goblin
Hidden in the abyss untrod;
And I knew there can be laughter
On the secret face of God.

Blow the trumpets, crown the sages,
Bring the age by reason fed!
('He that sitteth in the heavens,
'He shall laugh' - the prophet said).
[CW10:211]

In case you are wondering, that quote is from the second Psalm (King Jim's version); if you want the Chestertonian discussion, see the very end of Orthodoxy.

Somehow laughter does seem to be a fitting conclusion. And now (whew!) that ought to be long enough. I hope you weren't terribly bored, but then (let us say it together) "Now I deny most energetically that anything is, or can be, uninteresting." [Tremendous Trifles] Which includes your humble servant.

Paradoxically yours,
Dr. Thursday

Introducing Myself

2009-01-07T12:41:00.001-08:00

Hello! I go by Gandalf or Mythology Master. I'm not particular. I was first introduced to Chesterton when I saw a copy of Father Brown and the Church of Rome at a friend's house. Since then I have read all the Father Brown books that I could find, The Man Who Was Thursday, the Man Who Knew Too Much, and others.

Gandalf

Welcome to the New Flying-Ins

2009-01-07T10:33:00.001-08:00

Contributors, please introduce yourselves (including your introduction to and interest in Chesterton) even if you've done so before. Thanks much!