Publisher's Synopsis
Three Books in One! The three great apologies of G.K. Chesterton in one volume: Orthodoxy, Heretics & The Everlasting Man. This collection combines three of G.K. Chesterton's most recognized works into one convenient volume. This is perfect volume for Chesterton lovers, and students. Included in this book: - Orthodoxy - Heretics - The Everlasting Man In Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton gives a stirring defense of Christianity. Chesterton fought against the reductionist materialism with laughter, joy, and gratitude for the beauty of the world God has given us. We usually think of orthodoxy and the tenets of the Christian faith as dry, arbitrary, and perhaps even nonsensical. Chesterton shows that orthodoxy is beautiful and fits perfectly the strange, quirky world. For those of us who do not pay any attention to the strangeness of the world, this book is essential reading. The world may not have fairies, but it does have the sun, rivers, trees, and the sky, and they are as strange as anything we will find in a fairy tale. Read this book, then go outside and marvel. In Heretics, the topics Chesterton debates are as universal to the "vague moderns" of the 21st century as they were to those of the 20th. Focusing on "heretics" - those who pride themselves on their superiority to Christian views - Chesterton appraises prominent figures who fall into that category from the literary and art worlds. Luminaries such as Rudyard Kipling, George Bernard Shaw, H. G. Wells, and James McNeill Whistler come under the author's scrutiny, where they meet with equal measures of his characteristic wisdom and good humor. The topics he touches upon range from cosmology to anthropology to soteriology and he argues against French nihilism, German humanism, English utilitarianism, the syncretism of 'the vague modern', Social Darwinism, eugenics and the arrogance and misanthropy of the European intelligentsia. Together with Orthodoxy, this book is regarded as central to his corpus of moral theology. What, if anything, is it that makes the human uniquely human? This, in part, is the question that G.K. Chesterton starts with exploration of human history in this classic. Responding to the evolutionary materialism of his contemporary H.G. Wells, Chesterton in this work affirms human uniqueness and the unique message of the Christian faith. Writing at a time when social Darwinism was increasingly popular, Chesterton argued that the idea that society has been steadily progressing from a starting point of primitivism towards civilization, and of Jesus Christ as simply another charismatic figure, is completely inaccurate. Chesterton saw in Christianity a rare blending of philosophy and mythology, which he felt satisfies both the mind and the heart. Here, as so often in Chesterton, we sense a lived, awakened faith. All that he writes derives from a keen intellect guided by the heart's own knowledge. Gilbert Keith Chesterton was an English writer, philosopher, Christian apologist, a literary and art critic. He has been referred to as the ""prince of paradox"". Of his writing style, Time observed: ""Whenever possible, Chesterton made his points with popular sayings, proverbs, allegories-first carefully turning them inside out."" Chesterton created the fictional priest-detective Father Brown, and wrote on apologetics. Even some of those who disagree with him have recognised the wide appeal of such works as Orthodoxy and The Everlasting Man. Chesterton routinely referred to himself as an orthodox Christian, and came to identify this position more and more with Catholicism, eventually converting to Roman Catholicism from high church Anglicanism. Biographers have identified him as a successor to such Victorian authors as Matthew Arnold, Thomas Carlyle, John Henry Newman and John Ruskin.
