ed _The Doubts of Democracy_.

One essay in this volume, written in 1903, is of primary importance
in any study of the sources of _Orthodoxy_, for it gives a brilliant
outline of one of the main contentions of the book and shows even
better than _Orthodoxy_ itself what he meant by saying that he had
first learnt Christianity from its opponents. It is clear that by now
he believed in the Divinity of Christ. The pamphlet itself has fallen
into oblivion and Chesterton's share of it was only three short
essays. I think it well to quote a good deal from the first of these,
because in it he has put in concentrated form and with different
illustrations what he developed five years later. There is nothing
more packed with thought in the whole of his writings than these
essays.

The first of all the difficulties that I have in controverting Mr.
Blatchford is simply this, that I shall be very largely going over
his own ground. My favourite text-book of theology is _God and My
Neighbour_, but I cannot repeat it in detail. If I gave each of my
reasons for being a Christian, a vast number of them would be Mr.
Blatchford's reasons for not being one.

For instance, Mr. Blatchford and his school point out that there
are many myths parallel to the Christian story; that there were Pagan
Christs, and Red Indian Incarnations, and Patagonian Crucifixions,
for all I know or care. But does not Mr. Blatchford see the other
side of the fact? If the Christian God really made the human race,
would not the human race tend to rumours and perversions of the
Christian God? If the centre of our life is a certain fact, would not
people far from the centre have a muddled version of that fact? If we
are so made that a Son of God must deliver us, is it odd that
Patagonians should dream of a Son of God?

The Blatchfordian position really amounts to this--that because a
certain thing has impressed millions of different people as likely or
necessary, therefore it cannot be true. And then this bashful being,
veiling his own talents, convicts the wretched G.K.C. of paradox . . .

The story of a Christ is very common in legend and literature. So
is the story of two lovers parted by Fate. So is the story of two
friends killing each other for a woman. But will it seriously be
maintained that, because these two stories are common as legends,
therefore no two friends were ever separated