All modern thinkers are reactionaries; for their thought is always a reaction from what went before.
 G. K. Chesterton, What's Wrong with the World (1910). copy citation

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Author G. K. Chesterton
Source What's Wrong with the World
Topic reaction thoughts
Date 1910
Language English
Reference
Note
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1717/1717-h/1717-h.htm

Context

“It must be remembered that the modern world has done deep treason to the eternal intellect by believing in the swing of the pendulum. A man must be dead before he swings. It has substituted an idea of fatalistic alternation for the mediaeval freedom of the soul seeking truth. All modern thinkers are reactionaries; for their thought is always a reaction from what went before. When you meet a modern man he is always coming from a place, not going to it. Thus, mankind has in nearly all places and periods seen that there is a soul and a body as plainly as that there is a sun and moon.” source