hodoxy' is, I think, one of the most important of Chesterton's
books. The lasting importance of a book depends not so much on its
literary qualities or on its popularity, but rather on the theme
handled.

There are really two central themes handled in this book. One is of
Fairyland, the other is of the defence of Christianity; not that it is
either true or false, but that it is rational, or the most
shuffle-headed nonsense ever set to delude the human race. The method of
apology that Chesterton takes is one that would cause the average
theological student to turn white with fear.

The theological colleges, excellent as they are in endeavouring to train
efficient laymen into equally efficient priests, usually assume that the
best way to know about Christianity is to study Christian books. It is
the worst way, because these books are naturally biased in favour of it.
It is better to study any religion by seeing what the attackers have to
say against it. Then a personal judgment can be formed.

This is, I feel, the method that Chesterton adopts in his deep and
original treatise, 'Orthodoxy,' which is more than an essay and less
than a theological work.

The Chestertonian contention is that philosophers like Schopenhauer and
Nietzsche have embarked on the suicide of thought, and that a later
disciple to this self-destruction is Bernard Shaw.

In the same way these pseudo philosophers have attacked the Christian
religion, 'tearing the soul of Christ into silly strips labelled
altruism and egoism. They are alike puzzled by His insane magnificance
and His insane meekness.'

As I have said, the method to realize the worth of Christianity is to
read all the attacks on it. This is what Chesterton does. In doing so he
discovers that these attacks are the one thing that demonstrate the
strength of Christianity. Because the attackers reject it upon reasons
that are contradictory to each other. Thus some complain that it is a
gloomy religion; others go to the opposite extreme and accuse it of
pointing to a state of perpetual chocolate cream; yet again it is
attacked on grounds of effeminancy, it is upbraided as being fond of a
sickly sentimentalism.

Thus it is attacked on opposite grounds at once. It is condemned for
being pessimistic, it is blamed for being optimistic. From this position
Chesterton deduces that it is the only rational religion, because it
steers between the Scylla of pessimism and avoids the Charybdis of a