{"id":5382,"date":"2012-04-30T07:13:51","date_gmt":"2012-04-30T11:13:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.chesterton.org\/?page_id=5382"},"modified":"2018-11-16T23:10:50","modified_gmt":"2018-11-17T05:10:50","slug":"climb-down-the-chimney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.chesterton.org\/store\/climb-down-the-chimney\/","title":{"rendered":"Climb Down the Chimney"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>QUESTION:\u00a0<\/strong><em>In the 1992 film &#8220;Peter&#8217;s Friends&#8221; one of the characters quotes Chesterton. It was something about being dropped down a chimney randomly and trying to get along with the people in the house. I have been looking for the correct wording and the source of this quotation. Can you help?<\/em><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><strong>ANSWER:<\/strong> &#8220;The best way that man could test his readiness to encounter the common variety of mankind would be to climb down a chimney into any house at random, and get on as well as possible with the people inside. And that is essentially what each one of us did on the day that he was born.&#8221; Although the line is misquoted somewhat in the movie, the idea is the same. It\u2019s from Chesterton\u2019s wonderful essay, &#8220;On Certain Modern Writers and the Institution of the Family,&#8221; from his 1905 book <a href=\"https:\/\/www.chesterton.org\/shop\/heretics\"><em>Heretics<\/em><\/a>, an essay every one should read in a book everyone should read.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>QUESTION:\u00a0In the 1992 film &#8220;Peter&#8217;s Friends&#8221; one of the characters quotes Chesterton. It was something about being dropped down a chimney randomly and trying to get along with the people in the house. I have been looking for the correct wording and the source of this quotation. Can you help? ANSWER: &#8220;The best way that [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"give_campaign_id":0,"site-sidebar-layout":"right-sidebar","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"disabled","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[139],"tags":[977],"class_list":["post-5382","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-frequently-asked-questions","tag-faq"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Climb Down the Chimney<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"One of the most notorious quotations of G.K. 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