What's Wrong with the World

by Gilbert Keith Chesterton

DEDICATION

To C. F G. Masterman, M. P.

My Dear Charles,

I originally called this book "What is Wrong," and it would have satisfied your sardonic temper to note the number of social misunderstandings that arose from the use of the title. Many a mild lady visitor opened her eyes when I remarked casually, "I have been doing 'What is Wrong' all this morning." And one minister of religion moved quite sharply in his chair when I told him (as he understood it) that I had to run upstairs and do what was wrong, but should be down again in a minute. Exactly of what occult vice they silently accused me I cannot conjecture, but I know of what I accuse myself; and that is, of having written a very shapeless and inadequate book, and one quite unworthy to be dedicated to you. As far as literature goes, this book is what is wrong and no mistake.

It may seem a refinement of insolence to present so wild a composition to one who has recorded two or three of the really impressive visions of the moving millions of England. You are the only man alive who can make the map of England crawl with life; a most creepy and enviable accomplishment. Why then should I trouble you with a book which, even if it achieves its object (which is monstrously unlikely) can only be a thundering gallop of theory?

Well, I do it partly because I think you politicians are none the worse for a few inconvenient ideals; but more because you will recognise the many arguments we have had, those arguments which the most wonderful ladies in the world can never endure for very long. And, perhaps, you will agree with me that the thread of comradeship and conversation must be protected because it is so frivolous. It must be held sacred, it must not be snapped, because it is not worth tying together again. It is exactly because argument is idle that men (I mean males) must take it seriously; for when (we feel), until the crack of doom, shall we have so delightful a difference again? But most of all I offer it to you because there exists not only comradeship, but a very different thing, called friendship; an agreement under all the arguments and a thread which, please God, will never break.

Yours always,

G. K. Chesterton.

Contents

1 Part One: The Homelessness of Man

• 1.1 The Medical Mistake
• 1.2 Wanted: An Unpractical Man
• 1.3 The New Hypocrite
• 1.4 The Fear of the Past
• 1.5 The Unfinished Temple
• 1.6 The Enemies of Property
• 1.7 The Free Family
• 1.8 The Wildness of Domesticity
• 1.9 History of Hudge and Gudge
• 1.10 Oppression by Optimism
• 1.11 The Homelessness of Jones

2 Part Two: Imperialism, or the Mistake about Man

• 2.1 The Charm of Jingoism
• 2.2 Wisdom and the Weather
• 2.3 The Common Vision
• 2.4 The Insane Necessity

3 Part Three: Feminism, of the Mistake about Woman

• 3.1 The Unmilitary Suffragette
• 3.2 The Universal Stick
• 3.3 The Emancipation of Domesticity
• 3.4 The Romance of Thrift
• 3.5 The Coldness of Chloe
• 3.6 The Pedant and the Savage
• 3.7 The Modern Surrender of Woman
• 3.8 The Brand of the Fleur-de-Lis
• 3.9 Sincerity and the Gallows
• 3.10 The Higher Anarchy
• 3.11 The Queen and the Suffragettes
• 3.12 The Modern Slave

4 Part Four: Education, or the Mistake about the Child

• 4.1 The Calvinism of To-day
• 4.2 The Tribal Terror
• 4.3 The Tricks of Environment
• 4.4 The Truth about Education
• 4.5 An Evil Cry
• 4.6 Authority the Unavoidable
• 4.7 The Humility of Mrs. Grundy
• 4.8 The Broken Rainbow
• 4.9 The Need for Narrowness
• 4.10 The Case for the Public Schools
• 4.11 The School for Hypocrites
• 4.12 The Staleness of the New Schools
• 4.13 The Outlawed Parent
• 4.14 Folly and Female Education

5 Part Five: The Home of Man

• 5.1 The Empire of the Insect
• 5.2 The Fallacy of the Umbrella Stand
• 5.3 The Dreadful Duty of Gudge
• 5.4 A Last Instance
• 5.5 Conclusion

6 Three Notes

• 6.1 On Female Suffrage
• 6.2 On Cleanliness in Education
• 6.3 On Peasant Proprietorship