Either from the original Chesterton stories or the BBC series.
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Some :Ne:-heavy archetype? EII-Ne from me.
I am sure he's SX last. Head fix 5w6, gut fix 1, heart fix 2.
Men may keep a sort of level of good, but no man has ever been able to keep on one level of evil. That road goes down and down. The kind man drinks and turns cruel; the frank man kills and lies about it.
But every clever crime is founded ultimately on some one quite simple factsome fact that is not itself mysterious. The mystification comes in covering it up, in leading men's thoughts away from it.
"What we all dread most," said the priest in a low voice, "is a maze with no center. That is why atheism is only a nightmare."
"Put a feather with a fossil and a bit of coral and everyone will think it's a specimen. Put the same feather with a ribbon and an artificial flower and everyone will think it's for a lady's hat. Put the same feather with an ink-bottle, a book and a stack of writing-paper, and most men will swear they've seen a quill pen. So you saw that map among tropic birds and shells and thought it was a map of Pacific Islands. It was the map of this river."
"Real madmen," explained Father Brown, "always encourage their own morbidity. They never strive against it. But you are trying to find traces of the burglar; even when there aren't any. You are struggling against it. You want what no madman ever wants." - "And what is that?" - "You want to be proved wrong," said Brown.
"But consider. The more a man feels lonely the less he can be sure he is alone. It must mean empty spaces round him, and they are just what make him obvious.
"We can direct our moral wills, but we can't generally change our instinctive tastes and ways of doing things."
Have you ever noticed thisthat people never answer what you say? They answer what you meanor what they think you mean
"I was seasick," said Father Brown simply. "I felt simply horrible. But feeling horrible has nothing to do with not seeing things."
"One is never thinking of the real sorrow," said the strange priest. "One can only be kind when it comes."
"Ten false philosophies will fit the universe; ten false theories will fit Glengyle Castle. But we want the real explanation of the castle and the universe."
" Never mind; one can sometimes do good by being the right person in the wrong place."
Humility is the mother of giants. One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.
"If the devil tells you something is too fearful to look at, look at it. If he says something is too terrible to hear, hear it. If you think some truth unbearable, bear it."
"Mere figure and gait, however distant, are more likely to remind us of somebody than a well-made-up face quite close.
"I am a man," answered Father Brown gravely; "and therefore have all devils in my heart."
" Oh, let me be silly a little. You don't know how unhappy I have been. And now I know that there has been no deep sin in this business at all. Only a little lunacy, perhapsand who minds that?"
"You have to know something of the mind as well as the body," answered the priest; "we have to know something of the body as well as the mind."
"The modern mind always mixes up two different ideas: mystery in the sense of what is marvelous, and mystery in the sense of what is complicated. That is half its difficulty about miracles. A miracle is startling, but it is simple. It is simple because it is a miracle. It is power coming directly from God (or the devil) instead of indirectly through nature or human wills."
x
Some :Ne:-heavy archetype? EII-Ne from me.
I am sure he's SX last. Head fix 5w6, gut fix 1, heart fix 2.
Quote:
Men may keep a sort of level of good, but no man has ever been able to keep on one level of evil. That road goes down and down. The kind man drinks and turns cruel; the frank man kills and lies about it.
But every clever crime is founded ultimately on some one quite simple factsome fact that is not itself mysterious. The mystification comes in covering it up, in leading men's thoughts away from it.
"What we all dread most," said the priest in a low voice, "is a maze with no center. That is why atheism is only a nightmare."
"Put a feather with a fossil and a bit of coral and everyone will think it's a specimen. Put the same feather with a ribbon and an artificial flower and everyone will think it's for a lady's hat. Put the same feather with an ink-bottle, a book and a stack of writing-paper, and most men will swear they've seen a quill pen. So you saw that map among tropic birds and shells and thought it was a map of Pacific Islands. It was the map of this river."
"Real madmen," explained Father Brown, "always encourage their own morbidity. They never strive against it. But you are trying to find traces of the burglar; even when there aren't any. You are struggling against it. You want what no madman ever wants." - "And what is that?" - "You want to be proved wrong," said Brown.
"But consider. The more a man feels lonely the less he can be sure he is alone. It must mean empty spaces round him, and they are just what make him obvious.
"We can direct our moral wills, but we can't generally change our instinctive tastes and ways of doing things."
Have you ever noticed thisthat people never answer what you say? They answer what you meanor what they think you mean
"I was seasick," said Father Brown simply. "I felt simply horrible. But feeling horrible has nothing to do with not seeing things."
"One is never thinking of the real sorrow," said the strange priest. "One can only be kind when it comes."
"Ten false philosophies will fit the universe; ten false theories will fit Glengyle Castle. But we want the real explanation of the castle and the universe."
" Never mind; one can sometimes do good by being the right person in the wrong place."
Humility is the mother of giants. One sees great things from the valley; only small things from the peak.
"If the devil tells you something is too fearful to look at, look at it. If he says something is too terrible to hear, hear it. If you think some truth unbearable, bear it."
"Mere figure and gait, however distant, are more likely to remind us of somebody than a well-made-up face quite close.
"I am a man," answered Father Brown gravely; "and therefore have all devils in my heart."
" Oh, let me be silly a little. You don't know how unhappy I have been. And now I know that there has been no deep sin in this business at all. Only a little lunacy, perhapsand who minds that?"
"You have to know something of the mind as well as the body," answered the priest; "we have to know something of the body as well as the mind."
"The modern mind always mixes up two different ideas: mystery in the sense of what is marvelous, and mystery in the sense of what is complicated. That is half its difficulty about miracles. A miracle is startling, but it is simple. It is simple because it is a miracle. It is power coming directly from God (or the devil) instead of indirectly through nature or human wills."
x