Post: #1

Last month we read Edward Bernay's propaganda, a look back 100 years ago to the foundation of the world we live in.

Orthodoxy represents an alternate path that we did not take. G.K. Chesterton is probably one of the greatest writers in the English language, but a bit like Thomas Carlyle, rather forgotten because of his plainly reactionary and Christian ethos.

The book rebukes the essence of the insane modern thought that has become prevalent these days.

Quote:I freely confess all the idiotic ambitions of the end of the nineteenth century. I did, like all other solemn little boys, try to be in advance of the age. Like them I tried to be some ten minutes in advance of the truth. And I found that I was eighteen hundred years behind it. I did strain my voice with a painfully juvenile exaggeration in uttering my truths. And I was punished in the fittest and funniest way, for I have kept my truths: but I have discovered, not that they were not truths, but simply that they were not mine. When I fancied that I stood alone I was really in the ridiculous position of being backed up by all Christendom. It may be, Heaven forgive me, that I did try to be original; but I only succeeded in inventing all by myself an inferior copy of the existing traditions of civilized religion. The man from the yacht thought he was the first to find England; I thought I was the first to find Europe. I did try to found a heresy of my own; and when I had put the last touches to it, I discovered that it was orthodoxy.

He takes many steps back, and justifies religion and religious thought as necessary for the health of the human mind. We see very clearly that secular societies are generally dying societies. Although they have higher material standards of living, and are generally pleasant, they are being wiped out. He understands and explains why the human mind needs religion to keep itself from killing itself.

Quote:The sages, it is often said, can see no answer to the riddle of religion. But the trouble with our sages is not that they cannot see the answer; it is that they cannot even see the riddle. They are like children so stupid as to notice nothing paradoxical in the playful assertion that a door is not a door. The modern latitudinarians speak, for instance, about authority in religion not only as if there were no reason in it, but as if there had never been any reason for it. Apart from seeing its philosophical basis, they cannot even see its historical cause. Religious authority has often, doubtless, been oppressive or unreasonable; just as every legal system (and especially our present one) has been callous and full of a cruel apathy. It is rational to attack the police; nay, it is glorious. But the modern critics of religious authority are like men who should attack the police without ever having heard of burglars. For there is a great and possible peril to the human mind: a peril as practical as burglary. Against it religious authority was reared, rightly or wrongly, as a barrier. And against it something certainly must be reared as a barrier, if our race is to avoid ruin.

That peril is that the human intellect is free to destroy itself. Just as one generation could prevent the very existence of the next generation, by all entering a monastery or jumping into the sea, so one set of thinkers can in some degree prevent further thinking by teaching the next generation that there is no validity in any human thought. It is idle to talk always of the alternative of reason and faith. Reason is itself a matter of faith. It is an act of faith to assert that our thoughts have any relation to reality at all. If you are merely a sceptic, you must sooner or later ask yourself the question, "Why should ANYTHING go right; even observation and deduction? Why should not good logic be as misleading as bad logic? They are both movements in the brain of a bewildered ape?" The young sceptic says, "I have a right to think for myself." But the old sceptic, the complete sceptic, says, "I have no right to think for myself. I have no right to think at all."

There is a thought that stops thought. That is the only thought that ought to be stopped. That is the ultimate evil against which all religious authority was aimed. It only appears at the end of decadent ages like our own: and already Mr. H.G.Wells has raised its ruinous banner; he has written a delicate piece of scepticism called "Doubts of the Instrument." In this he questions the brain itself, and endeavours to remove all reality from all his own assertions, past, present, and to come. But it was against this remote ruin that all the military systems in religion were originally ranked and ruled. The creeds and the crusades, the hierarchies and the horrible persecutions were not organized, as is ignorantly said, for the suppression of reason. They were organized for the difficult defence of reason. Man, by a blind instinct, knew that if once things were wildly questioned, reason could be questioned first. The authority of priests to absolve, the authority of popes to define the authority, even of inquisitors to terrify: these were all only dark defences erected round one central authority, more undemonstrable, more supernatural than all—the authority of a man to think. We know now that this is so; we have no excuse for not knowing it. For we can hear scepticism crashing through the old ring of authorities, and at the same moment we can see reason swaying upon her throne. In so far as religion is gone, reason is going. For they are both of the same primary and authoritative kind. They are both methods of proof which cannot themselves be proved. And in the act of destroying the idea of Divine authority we have largely destroyed the idea of that human authority by which we do a long-division sum. With a long and sustained tug we have attempted to pull the mitre off pontifical man; and his head has come off with it.

Lest this should be called loose assertion, it is perhaps desirable, though dull, to run rapidly through the chief modern fashions of thought which have this effect of stopping thought itself. Materialism and the view of everything as a personal illusion have some such effect; for if the mind is mechanical, thought cannot be very exciting, and if the cosmos is unreal, there is nothing to think about. But in these cases the effect is indirect and doubtful. In some cases it is direct and clear; notably in the case of what is generally called evolution.

http://www.amazon.com/Orthodoxy-G-K-Ches...1449529259

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/130

I hope you all enjoy it. Find it for free at Gutenberg or your library, or buy it on Amazon.

Post: #2

Good call. I have always wanted to read Chesterton.

I've noticed that for many tenured "academics," Chesterton is to the literary canon what Cape Verde is to Africa - technically part of the continent, but not relevant to the mainland.

By the way, I notice that he has quite a few other books. Any other recommendations from his work?

Post: #3

Exciting. This is a hotly discussed topic even here on RVF. I will be joining in. Perhaps I will finally understand.

Post: #4

This is perhaps the best example of pseudo intellectualism I have ever seen.

Amusingly, Chesterton is by his own definition a madman.

Post: #5

^ Could you get more into details?

Chesterson is a guy I always wanted to read but I have a lot of other readings to get around to so my time is limited. Time I spent reading something not worth reading is time down the toilet which I can't go back so I'd like to know if this is something that is worth my attention.

Post: #6

I've never heard of Chesterton. I'll have to do a quick google search before diving into this book. It doesn't look long, I'll probably finish it in a sitting or two.

Post: #7

A couple of quotes I like from what I have read so far….

“Of all horrible religions the most horrible is the worship of the god within.”

So much speaks to modern society here. For example, the deification of oneself, via self-help philosophies. This can lead to an inability to accept constructive criticism. For example, who are you to judge me if I am, in fact, Godlike? I have seen many young women, and a growing number of men, who think in such a way.

In addition, self-deification fails to provide a Weltanschauung for the society at large.

“The only objection to Natural Religion is that somehow it always becomes unnatural. A man loves Nature in the morning for her innocence and amiability, and at nightfall, if he is loving her still, it is for her darkness and her cruelty.”

Another truism. There is a flaw to the “Nature is God” philosophy that we have seen periodically throughout American history (the hippies/the transcendentalists). However, as Chesterton points out, there is also a brutal side to nature. The Natural Religion can often paint a one-sided portrait of the natural world, which is a simplistic doctrine.

Post: #8

I'm working my way through it at the moment. I am about halfway through, and I think there are some legitimate criticisms that can be made of Chesterton's arguments. One passage that I've come across that I particularly liked though is:

"Those who urge against tradition that men in the past were ignorant may go and urge it at the Carlton Club, along with the statement that voters in the slums are ignorant. It will not do for us. If we attach great importance to the opinion of ordinary men in great unanimity when we are dealing with daily matters, there is no reason why we should disregard it when we are dealing with history or fable. Tradition may be defined as an extension of the franchise. Tradition means giving votes to the most obscure of all classes, our ancestors. It is the democracy of the dead. Tradition refuses to submit to the small and arrogant oligarchy of those who merely happen to be walking about. All democrats object to men being disqualified by the accident of birth; tradition objects to their being disqualified by the accident of death. Democracy tells us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our groom; tradition asks us not to neglect a good man's opinion, even if he is our father. I, at any rate, cannot separate the two ideas of democracy and tradition; it seems evident to me that they are the same idea. We will have the dead at our councils. The ancient Greeks voted by stones; these shall vote by tombstones. It is all quite regular and official, for most tombstones, like most ballot papers, are marked with a cross."

Post: #9

"The evil of the pessimist is, then, not that he chastises gods and men, but that he does not love what he chastises—he has not this primary and supernatural loyalty to things."

This is a hugely perceptive quote, and is the core of the Leftist's evil. The leftist does not love that which he chastises (his country/religion), rather he loathes it, and consequently his criticism is not aimed at reformation or improvement, but at simple destruction of the hated thing. This hated thing is far deeper than a mere unfashionable point of view, or an opposing political stance. It is the hatred of an idea, an idea made manifest in every institution and every act of simple kindness that can be attributed to the idea itself. The Leftist is, then, the pessimist and the true nihilist, and his hatred is of an idea precisely because this idea is transcendent of the self.

Post: #10

Quotes are making me want to read this book. I will take a look in the future.

Post: #11

Not got that far into the book yet, but I'm enjoying the writing so far.

His belief in the power of Christian faith, as opposed to the ancestors of today's "spiritual but not religious" culture, shines through and his arguments are compelling, though I believe there will be several areas where I disagree with his framing.

Quote:The truth is that there is a real humility typical of our time; but it so happens that it is practically a more poisonous humility than the wildest prostrations of the ascetic. The old humility was a spur that prevented a man from stopping; not a nail in his boot that prevented him from going on. For the old humility made a man doubtful about his efforts, which might make him work harder. But the new humility makes a man doubtful about his aims, which will make him stop working altogether.

[...]

We are on the road to producing a race of men too mentally modest to believe in the multiplication table. We are in danger of seeing philosophers who doubt the law of gravity as being a mere fancy of their own. Scoffers of old time were too proud to be convinced; but these are too humble to be convinced. The meek do inherit the earth; but the modern sceptics are too meek even to claim their inheritance.

Quote:That peril is that the human intellect is free to destroy itself. Just as one generation could prevent the very existence of the next generation, by all entering a monastery or jumping into the sea, so one set of thinkers can in some degree prevent further thinking by teaching the next generation that there is no validity in any human thought.

[...]

There is a thought that stops thought. That is the only thought that ought to be stopped. That is the ultimate evil against which all religious authority was aimed. It only appears at the end of decadent ages like our own

"I'd hate myself if I had that kind of attitude, if I were that weak." - Arnold

Post: #12

Really glad you are all liking it.

I was re-reading part today, where he talks about "Elfland" and how fairytales touched him.

Quote:This is the tone of fairy tales, and it is certainly not lawlessness or even liberty, though men under a mean modern tyranny may think it liberty by comparison. People out of Portland Gaol might think Fleet Street free; but closer study will prove that both fairies and journalists are the slaves of duty. Fairy godmothers seem at least as strict as other godmothers. Cinderella received a coach out of Wonderland and a coachman out of nowhere, but she received a command—which might have come out of Brixton—that she should be back by twelve. Also, she had a glass slipper; and it cannot be a coincidence that glass is so common a substance in folk-lore. This princess lives in a glass castle, that princess on a glass hill; this one sees all things in a mirror; they may all live in glass houses if they will not throw stones. For this thin glitter of glass everywhere is the expression of the fact that the happiness is bright but brittle, like the substance most easily smashed by a housemaid or a cat. And this fairy-tale sentiment also sank into me and became my sentiment towards the whole world. I felt and feel that life itself is as bright as the diamond, but as brittle as the window-pane; and when the heavens were compared to the terrible crystal I can remember a shudder. I was afraid that God would drop the cosmos with a crash.

Remember, however, that to be breakable is not the same as to be perishable. Strike a glass, and it will not endure an instant; simply do not strike it, and it will endure a thousand years. Such, it seemed, was the joy of man, either in elfland or on earth; the happiness depended on NOT DOING SOMETHING which you could at any moment do and which, very often, it was not obvious why you should not do. Now, the point here is that to ME this did not seem unjust. If the miller's third son said to the fairy, "Explain why I must not stand on my head in the fairy palace," the other might fairly reply, "Well, if it comes to that, explain the fairy palace." If Cinderella says, "How is it that I must leave the ball at twelve?" her godmother might answer, "How is it that you are going there till twelve?" If I leave a man in my will ten talking elephants and a hundred winged horses, he cannot complain if the conditions partake of the slight eccentricity of the gift. He must not look a winged horse in the mouth. And it seemed to me that existence was itself so very eccentric a legacy that I could not complain of not understanding the limitations of the vision when I did not understand the vision they limited. The frame was no stranger than the picture. The veto might well be as wild as the vision; it might be as startling as the sun, as elusive as the waters, as fantastic and terrible as the towering trees.

For this reason (we may call it the fairy godmother philosophy) I never could join the young men of my time in feeling what they called the general sentiment of REVOLT. I should have resisted, let us hope, any rules that were evil, and with these and their definition I shall deal in another chapter. But I did not feel disposed to resist any rule merely because it was mysterious. Estates are sometimes held by foolish forms, the breaking of a stick or the payment of a peppercorn: I was willing to hold the huge estate of earth and heaven by any such feudal fantasy. It could not well be wilder than the fact that I was allowed to hold it at all. At this stage I give only one ethical instance to show my meaning. I could never mix in the common murmur of that rising generation against monogamy, because no restriction on sex seemed so odd and unexpected as sex itself. To be allowed, like Endymion, to make love to the moon and then to complain that Jupiter kept his own moons in a harem seemed to me (bred on fairy tales like Endymion's) a vulgar anti-climax. Keeping to one woman is a small price for so much as seeing one woman. To complain that I could only be married once was like complaining that I had only been born once. It was incommensurate with the terrible excitement of which one was talking. It showed, not an exaggerated sensibility to sex, but a curious insensibility to it. A man is a fool who complains that he cannot enter Eden by five gates at once. Polygamy is a lack of the realization of sex; it is like a man plucking five pears in mere absence of mind. The aesthetes touched the last insane limits of language in their eulogy on lovely things. The thistledown made them weep; a burnished beetle brought them to their knees. Yet their emotion never impressed me for an instant, for this reason, that it never occurred to them to pay for their pleasure in any sort of symbolic sacrifice. Men (I felt) might fast forty days for the sake of hearing a blackbird sing. Men might go through fire to find a cowslip. Yet these lovers of beauty could not even keep sober for the blackbird. They would not go through common Christian marriage by way of recompense to the cowslip. Surely one might pay for extraordinary joy in ordinary morals. Oscar Wilde said that sunsets were not valued because we could not pay for sunsets. But Oscar Wilde was wrong; we can pay for sunsets. We can pay for them by not being Oscar Wilde.

Post: #13

Finally finished the book today. Took longer than I expected, despite it being short, he talks around ideas a lot and there's not a huge amount of narrative flow.

Overall Orthodoxy gave me a lot to think about. Chesterton's foreshadowing of today's social justice obsession is eerie. Are we seeing the peak of a centuries-long social cycle, or will it just keep on escalating beyond comprehension?

Quote:In all these cases, therefore, I came back to the same conclusion: the sceptic was quite right to go by the facts, only he had not looked at the facts. The sceptic is too credulous; he believes in newspapers or even in encyclopedias.

Quote:Above all, the modern world (even while mocking sexual innocence) has flung itself into a generous idolatry of sexual innocence— the great modern worship of children.

The section on false equivalences in comparing Christianity to other religions was entertaining.

Quote:if you begin to look at beasts and men then ... you will observe that the startling thing is not how like man is to the brutes, but how unlike he is. It is the monstrous scale of his divergence that requires an explanation. That man and brute are like is, in a sense, a truism; but that being so like they should then be so insanely unlike, that is the shock and the enigma.

I do feel that he does pull comparisons out of thin air himself several times though - "people say x is y, but it is really z" - he occasionally throws out these unsupported assertions in favour of his arguments. But this is not a book that pretends to be academic, more a reassertion of the tradition of Christian apologetics.

"I'd hate myself if I had that kind of attitude, if I were that weak." - Arnold

Post: #14

Really liked the book. The whole tone is so jolly to me, so hopeful and bright. Such a positive affirmation of his beliefs. I've not read a book like it.

Post: #15

(12-23-2015 11:28 AM)MajorStyles Wrote:  ...By the way, I notice that he has quite a few other books. Any other recommendations from his work?

I read The Man Who Was Thursday. It's a work of metaphysical fiction and beautifully written.

Also read "What Is Wrong With The World". It is incredibly relevant to the spirit of our times, even if it was written over 100 years ago. Highly, highly recommend it.

On all the labels modern western society like to attach to everyone...

Quote:...the first great blunder of sociology. It is always called stating the disease before we find the cure. But it is the whole definition and dignity of man that in social matters we must actually find the cure before we find the disease.

On 'Tolerance'

Quote:I am quite ready to respect another man's faith; but it is too much to ask that I should respect his doubt, his worldly hesitations and fictions, his political bargain and make-believe.

The near-nearsightedness of 'progresives'

Quote:Some people do not like the word "dogma." Fortunately they are free, and there is an alternative for them. There are two things, and two things only, for the human mind, a dogma and a prejudice. The Middle Ages were a rational epoch, an age of doctrine. Our age is, at its best, a poetical epoch, an age of prejudice. A doctrine is a definite point; a prejudice is a direction.

Media bias and disregard for facts

Quote:Genuine controversy, fair cut and thrust before a common audience, has become in our special epoch very rare. For the sincere controversialist is above all things a good listener. The really burning enthusiast never interrupts; he listens to the enemy's arguments as eagerly as a spy would listen to the enemy's arrangements. But if you attempt an actual argument with a modern paper of opposite politics, you will find that no medium is admitted between violence and evasion. You will have no answer except slanging or silence.

And this. This is why we fight:

Quote:We often read nowadays of the valor or audacity with which some rebel attacks a hoary tyranny or an antiquated superstition. There is not really any courage at all in attacking hoary or antiquated things, any more than in offering to fight one's grandmother. The really courageous man is he who defies tyrannies young as the morning and superstitions fresh as the first flowers. The only true free-thinker is he whose intellect is as much free from the future as from the past. He cares as little for what will be as for what has been; he cares only for what ought to be.

Post: #16

I read Orthodoxy probably 20+ years ago. I enjoyed it but it left a nagging feeling that perhaps he was pulling a fast one on me. That said he full of insights and bon mots. One of my favourite quotes of his which I'm sure you'll all appreciate is:

“Ten thousand women marched through the streets shouting, 'We will not be dictated to,' and went off and became stenographers.”

It sums up feminism perfectly.