k which
begins one of the _Tremendous Trifles_, "Every now and then I have
introduced into my essays an element of truth."

Twice upon a time there was a Samuel Butler who wrote exhilaratingly and
died and left the paradoxical contents of his notebooks to be published
by posterity. The first (i.e. of Hudibras, not of Erewhon) had many
lively things to say on the question of orthodoxy, being the forerunner
of G.K.C. And I am greatly tempted to treat Samuel Butler as an ancestor
to be described at length. Chesterton might well have said, "It is a
dangerous thing to be too inquisitive, and search too narrowly into a
true Religion, for 50,000 Bethshemites were destroyed only for looking
into the Ark of the Covenant, and ten times as many have been ruined for
looking too curiously into that Booke in which that Story is
recorded"--in fact in _Magic_ he very nearly did say the same thing. He
would have liked (as who would not?) to have been the author of the
saying that "Repentant Teares are the waters upon which the Spirit of
God moves," or that "There is no better Argument to prove that the
Scriptures were written by Divine Inspiration, than that excellent
saying of our Savior, If any man will go to Law with thee for thy cloke,
give him thy Coate also." He might well have written dozens of those
puns and aphorisms of Butler which an unkind fate has omitted from the
things we read, and even from the things we quote. But Butler provides
an answer to Chesterton, for he was an intelligent anticipator who
foresaw exactly what would happen when orthodoxy, which is to say the
injunction to shout with the larger crowd, should be proclaimed as the
easiest way out of religious difficulties. Before a reader has finally
made up his mind on _Orthodoxy_ (and it is highly desirable that he
should do so), let him consider two little texts:

"They that profess Religion and believe it
consists in frequenting of Sermons, do, as if they
should say They have a great desire to serve God,
but would faine be perswaded to it. Why should any
man suppose that he pleases God by patiently
hearing an Ignorant fellow render Religion
ridiculous?"

"He [a Catholic] prefers his Church merely for the
Antiquity of it, and cares not how sound or
rotten it be, so it be but old. He takes a liking
to it as some do to old Cheese, only for the blue