I have remarked that the materialist, like the madman, is in prison; in
the prison of one thought. These people seemed to think it singularly inspiring to keep on saying that the prison was very large. The size of
this scientific universe gave one no novelty, no relief. The cosmos went on for ever, but not in its wildest constellation could there be anything
really interesting; anything, for instance, such as forgiveness or free will. The grandeur or infinity of the secret of its cosmos added nothing
to it. It was like telling a prisoner in Reading gaol that he would be glad to hear that the gaol now covered half the county. The warder would
have nothing to show the man except more and more long corridors of stone lit by ghastly lights and empty of all that is human. So these expanders
of the universe had nothing to show us except more and more infinite corridors of space lit by ghastly suns and empty of all that is divine. In
fairyland there had been a real law; a law that could be broken, for the definition of a law is something that can be broken. But the machinery of
this cosmic prison was something that could not be broken; for we ourselves were only a part of its machinery. We were either unable to do
things or we were destined to do them.
Orthodoxy, first published in 1908, by G. K. Chesterton, is in the public domain, and available from Project Gutenberg. The previous post in this series is here.
Thanks for reading! Read Chesterton.
Musings on science, the Bible, and fantastic literature (and sometimes basketball and other stuff).
God speaks to us through the Bible and the findings of science, and we should listen to both types of revelation.
The title is from Psalm 84:11.
The Wikipedia is usually a pretty good reference. I mostly use the World English Bible (WEB), because it is public domain. I am grateful.
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The posts in this blog are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. You can copy and use this material, as long as you aren't making money from it. If you give me credit, thanks. If not, OK.
Sunday, April 12, 2015
Excerpts from Orthodoxy, by Gilbert K. Chesterton, 18
Labels:
Chesterton,
cosmology,
Cosmos,
G. K. Chesterton,
Orthodoxy,
universe
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