n them so
much to stimulate thought and to rehabilitate strongholds held
precariously, as to awaken both appreciation and gratitude.

Mr. Chesterton's political opinions do not concern us here. It is a
curious fact, of which innumerable illustrations may be found in past
and present writers, that political radicalism so often goes along with
conservative theology, and _vice versa_. Mr. Chesterton is no exception
to the rule. His orthodoxy in matters of faith we shall find to be
altogether above suspicion. His radicalism in politics is never long
silent. He openly proclaims himself at war with Carlyle's favourite
dogma, "The tools to him who can use them." "The worst form of slavery,"
he tells us, "is that which is called Caesarism, or the choice of some
bold or brilliant man as despot because he is suitable. For that means
that men choose a representative, not because he represents them but
because he does not." And if it be answered that the worst form of
cruelty to a nation or to an individual is that abuse of the principle
of equality which is for ever putting incompetent people into false
positions, he has his reply ready: "The one specially and peculiarly
un-Christian idea is the idea of Carlyle--the idea that the man should
rule who feels that he can rule. Whatever else is Christian, this is
heathen."

But this, and much else of its kind, although he works it into his
general scheme of thinking, is not in any sense an essential part of
that scheme. Our subject is his place in the conflict between the
paganism and the idealism of the times, and it is a sufficiently large
one. But before we come to that, we must consider another matter, which
we shall find to be intimately connected with it.

That other matter is his habit of paradox, which is familiar to all his
readers. It is a habit of style, but before it became that it was
necessarily first a habit of mind, deeply ingrained. He disclaims it so
often that we cannot but feel that he protesteth too much. He
acknowledges it, and explains that "paradox simply means a certain
defiant joy which belongs to belief." Whether the explanation is or is
not perfectly intelligible, it must occur to every one that a writer who
finds it necessary to give so remarkable an explanation can hardly be
justified in his astonishment when people of merely average intelligence
confess themselves puzzled. His aversion to Walter Pater--almost the
only writer whom he appears consistentl