Giant Wit
The cross has become something more than a historical memory; it does convey, almost as by a mathematical diagram, the truth about the real point at issue; the idea of a conflict stretching outwards into eternity. It is true, and even tautological, to say that the cross is the crux of the whole matter.
G. K. Chesterton, The Everlasting Man
Gilbert Keith Chesterton cast a giant shadow: literarily and figuratively. He was a large man—six foot four and topping four hundred pounds—and a giant of literature. Although most of his eighty or so books, two hundred stories, four thousand essays, countless articles, and a few plays are largely forgotten in the twenty-first century, he influenced some of the greatest writers. C. S. Lewis credits Chesterton’s The Everlasting Man in aiding his conversion from atheism to Christian faith. Mahatma Gandhi was also influenced by Chesterton. When he died, Chesterton was praised by T. S. Eliot and H. G. Wells (with whom Chesterton debated). His writing also influenced J. R. R. Tolkien, Franz Kafka, George Bernard Shaw, Dorothy L. Sayers, Graham Green, Ernest Hemingway, Agatha Christie, Orson Welles, Philip Yancey, J. K. Rowling, and scores of others.
Sometimes the impact of a person’s work is seen in the inspiration it provides others.
Humor as a Hammer
Great communicators have long known that people swallow more truth when it’s served with humor. No matter how serious the topic, Chesterton could find a way to make an important aspect memorable. Consider the quote above. What could be more serious and weighty than the cross of Christ? The last clause, “to say that the cross is the crux of the whole matter,” is a play on words. Crux is Latin for cross. “The cross is the cross of the matter.” Crux came to mean “an important point in an issue.”
Chesterton was a master of paradox, the twisting of the assumed into something new. He wrote, “I believe in getting into hot water; I think it keeps you clean.”1 That sentence carries more meaning than expected and demands additional thought.
Chesterton used this kind of communication to make his point stronger and make it linger in the memory. He used this device frequently and to great effect. He is one of the most quoted men in history. He can be found in almost any book of quotations.
The thing I hate about arguments is that it always interrupts a discussion.
If there were no God, there would be no Atheists.
Every man is important if he loses his life; and every man is funny if he loses his hat and has to run after it.
Art, like morality, consists of drawing the line somewhere.
He even found himself humorous. Once, while exiting a car, he became stuck in the door. Later he said, “I would have tried to exit sideways, but I have no sideways.”
Although brought up in the Church of England, Chesterton became fascinated with Roman Catholicism. His famous series of mystery novels starring Father Brown came from a discussion he had with a Catholic priest. His defense of Christianity by word and by example remained profitable to Protestant and Catholic alike. In an age that more and more saw Christianity as a myth for the unenlightened, Chesterton fought back with unassailable reason and humility. Even anti-Christian writers like H. G. Wells and George Bernard Shaw (he of “I’m an atheist and I thank God for it” fame) remained friendly with Chesterton.
Whether Protestant or Catholic, Chesterton remained true to his conviction that Christianity was the truth needed by the world. “The Christian ideal has not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and left untried.”2
Some of the finest minds of history had decided atheism was the choice of thinking people, and only less enlightened folk clung to “old myths” like Christianity. Chesterton was proof to the contrary. He was every bit their match and then some. In his words, “Fallacies do not cease to be fallacies because they become fashion.”3 His books defending the faith (Heretics, 1905; Orthodoxy, 1908; The Everlasting Man, 1925) remain powerful and useful to those searching for a reason to believe.
Chesterton turned humor and wit into tools that won the admiration of the rationalists of his day even if he didn’t win their souls. He died in June 1936 of congestive heart failure at the age of sixty-two.