I left the fairy tales lying on the floor of the nursery, and I have not found any books so sensible since.
Interpretation
The quote reflects a transition from childhood fantasies to a desire for practical knowledge.
In this quote, Gilbert K. Chesterton expresses the idea that as we grow up, we often abandon the youthful idealism and fairy tales that once captivated us. He suggests that in adulthood, we may find that practical wisdom and sensible perspectives are harder to come by than the imaginative stories we cherished as children, highlighting a longing for the clarity and excitement of those early dreams amidst the complexities of adult life.
In practice
In a motivational speech on embracing reality, one might reference this quote to illustrate the importance of practicality.
Tradition does not mean a dead town; it does not mean that the living are dead but that the dead are alive. It means that it still matters what Penn did two hundred years ago or what Franklin did a hundred years ago; I never could feel in New York that it mattered what anybody did an hour ago.
I owe my success to having listened respectfully to the very best advice, and then going away and doing the exact opposite.
The good Bishop of Assisi expressed a sort of horror at the hard life which the Little Brothers lived at the Portiuncula, without comforts, without possessions, eating anything they could get and sleeping anyhow on the ground. St. Francis answered him with that curious and almost stunning shrewdness which the unworldly can sometimes wield like a club of stone. He said, 'If we had any possessions, we should need weapons and laws to defend them.
The ordinary scientific man is strictly a sentimentalist. He is a sentimentalist in this essential sense, that he is soaked and swept away by mere associations.
I suppose every one must have reflected how primeval and how poetical are the things that one carries in one's pocket; the pocket-knife, for instance, the type of all human tools, the infant of the sword. Once I planned to write a book of poems entirely about things in my pockets. But I found it would be too long; and the age of the great epics is past.
Madness does not come by breaking out, but by giving in; by settling down in some dirty, little, self-repeating circle of ideas; by being tamed.
Don’t ever underestimate the importance of money. I know it’s often been said that money won’t make you happy and this is undeniably true, but everything else being equal, it’s a lovely thing to have around the house.
The sinners to whom Jesus directed His messianic ministry were not those who skipped morning devotions or Sunday church. His ministry was to those whom society considered real sinners. They had done nothing to merit salvation. Yet they opened themselves to the gift that was offered them. On the other hand, the self-righteous placed their trust in the works of the Law and closed their hearts to the message of grace.
It is a good rule never to look into the face of a man in the morning till you have looked into the face of God.
People with intelligence must use their intelligence, people with eyes must use their eyes, people with the capacity to love have the impulse to love and the need to love in order to feel healthy. Capacities clamor to be used, and cease their clamor only when they are used sufficiently. That is to say, capacities are needs, and therefore are intrinsic values as well.
Our best work can't possibly appeal to the average masses, only our average work can. Finding the humility to happily walk away from those that don't get it unlocks our ability to do great work.
Even truth needs to be clad in new garments if it is to appeal to a new age.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.