'I don't believe you've changed at all, Charles.' 'No, I'm afraid not.' 'D'you want to change?' 'It's the only evidence of life.'

No one could really hate a saint, could they? They can't really hate God either. When they want to Hate Him and His saints they have to find something like themselves and pretends it's God and hate that.

There is practically no sense that is not violated every time we return from the country or the sea to Paris or London or New York.

His heart; some long word at the heart. He is dying of a long word.

There's only one great evil in the world today. Despair.

I should like to bury something precious in every place where I've been happy and then, when I'm old and ugly and miserable, I could come back and dig it up and remember.

The Roman Catholic Church has the unique power of keeping remote control over human souls which have once been part of her. G.K. Chesterton has compared this to the fisherman's line, which allows the fish the illusion of free play in the water and yet has him by the hook; in his own time the fisherman by a 'twitch upon the thread' draws the fish to land.