“The disintegration of rational society started in the drift from the hearth and the family”, wrote G. K. Chesterton in 1933. “The solution must be a drift back.”
In a world that has lost touch with normality, it takes a pioneer to rediscover the wonders of the normal. This masterful compilation of texts and quotes from the prolific G. K. Chesterton, edited by Dale Ahlquist, illustrates the glory of the family—the heritage of romance, love, marriage, parenthood, and home. It is a hymn in praise of the saucepan, the kettle, the hairbrush, the umbrella stand, what Chesterton calls “the brave old bones of life”. With piercing wit, the English writer pits all these venerable truths against the fashions of divorce, contraception, and abortion, along with the troubling philosophies that have afflicted education and the workplace since the early twentieth century.
Society is built on the family, in all its unglamorous beauty, and Chesterton helps readers to see this reality with fresh eyes. As he writes: “The first things must be the very fountains of life, love and birth and babyhood; and these are always covered fountains, flowing in the quiet courts of the home.”
“G. K. Chesterton was not only a great defender of the faith but a great defender of the family also. This excellent collection of the best of Chesterton’s writing on the family is more needed today than it was in Chesterton’s own day.”
— Joseph Pearce, Author, Wisdom and Innocence: A Life of G. K. Chesterton
“With the eyes of a prophet, Chesterton knew that the world’s embrace of the family as the primary social unit was coming to an end. Modernity and postmodernity cannot handle such a wondrous institution. Watching Chesterton defend the family is a joy.”
— Bradley Birzer, Ph.D., Professor of History, Hillsdale College
“Brilliance is made the way a spark is made, when steel is struck by something harder than it is. Chesterton’s brain is the flint that strikes subjects we find hard, like marriage, divorce, oaths, promises, love, and sex.”
— David Fagerberg, Ph.D., Professor of Theology, University of Notre Dame; Author, Liturgical Dogmatics
“We are travelling through a desert of illusion in our surreal modern world with the phantasms of the human person and the family that dominate our culture. The wisdom of Chesterton on the family is an oasis, from which we may draw water joyfully.”
— Thomas Cardinal Collins, Archbishop of Toronto, Ontario
“Assembled so brilliantly by Ahlquist, this Chesterton chrestomathy does with rapier wit and robust humor what so few could do—make laughingstocks of those sappers who are so earnestly undermining the family in the name of freedom. The Woke should fear this book. Everyone else should buy it.”
— Robert Reilly, Author, America on Trial and Making Gay Okay
“This book is exactly what the doctor ordered for a society that has lost its mind when it comes to defining the family and the sexes. A timely and seminal collection of Chestertonian wit and wisdom on marriage and divorce, love and sex, parents and children, birth control and public education.”
— Louis Markos, Ph.D., Professor of English, Houston Baptist University; Author, On the Shoulders of Hobbits
“Mankind’s future depends on whether we embrace or reject the wisdom of this book. Read this book before doing so becomes a criminal act.”
— Christopher Check, President, Catholic Answers
