of Christianity stands another figure in whose hand also is the cup of the vine.  “Drink,” he says, “for the whole world is as red as this wine with the crimson of the love and wrath of God.  Drink, for the trumpets are blowing for battle, and this is the stirrup-cup.  Drink, for this is My blood of the New Testament that is shed for you.  Drink, for I know whence you come and why.  Drink, for I know when you go and where.”—­“Heretics.”

[Sidenote:  G.K.  Chesterton]

Everything is military in the sense that everything depends upon obedience.  There is no perfectly epicurean corner; there is no perfectly irresponsible place.  Everywhere men have made the way for us with sweat and submission.  We may fling ourselves into a hammock in a fit of divine carelessness; but we are glad that the net-maker did not make the net in a fit of divine carelessness.  We may jump upon a child’s rocking-horse for a joke; but we are glad that the carpenter did not leave the legs of it unglued for a joke.—­“Heretics.”

[Sidenote:  G.K.  Chesterton]

The only way of catching a train I have ever discovered is to miss the train before.—­“Tremendous Trifles.”

[Sidenote:  G.K.  Chesterton]

In a hollow of the grey-green hills of rainy Ireland lived an old, old woman, whose uncle was always Cambridge at the Boat-race.  But in her grey-green hollows, she knew nothing of this; she didn’t know that there was a Boat-race.  Also she did not know that she had an uncle.  She had heard of nobody at all, except of George the First, of whom she had heard (I know not why), and in whose historical memory she put her simple trust.  And by and by, in God’s good time, it was discovered that this uncle of hers was really not her uncle, and they came and told her so.  She smiled through her tears, and said only, “Virtue is its own reward.”—­“The Napoleon of Notting Hill.”

In a world without humour, the only thing to do is to eat.  And how perfect an exception!  How can these people strike dignified attitudes, and pretend that things matter, when the total ludicrousness of life is proved by the very method by which it is supported?  A man strikes the lyre, and says, “Life is real, life is earnest,” and then goes into a room and stuffs alien substances into a hole in his head.—­“The Napoleon of Notting Hill.”

[Sidenote:  G.K.  Chesterton]

A man must be orthodox upon most things, or he will never even have time to preach his own heresy.—­“George Bernard Shaw.”

[Sidenote:  G.K.  Chesterton]