In his “Autobiography,” Chesterton states that he had some talk about poetry and property with Yeats at the Dublin Art Club, “a most exhilarating evening.” Yeats asked Chesterton to debate at the Abbey Theatre, defending property on its more purely political side, against an able leader of Liberty Hall, the famous stronghold of Labor politics in Dublin, Robert Johnson, who was exceedingly popular with the proletarian Irish.
“That passage from G. K. C.’s ‘Autobiography’ is correct so far as I can remember,” wrote Yeats in a second letter. “It was a time when the English Government was stopping discussion and we kept discussion open at the Abbey Theatre when it had stopped elsewhere, by getting people to speak on the conservative side and letting debate develop as it likes afterwards. Johnson who replied to Chesterton was at that time the most important Irish labour leader: he is still very important. He was in the Irish Senate for some years, Bernard Shaw lectured either the week after or the week before Chesterton. Both men were brilliant, Chesterton taking the line that the possession of small properties was essential to liberty, Johnson putting the Trades Union point of view that it was more important for the workman to spend his money on his children than to save it.”
Cuthbert Wright’s only personal connection with Chesterton was to have been mentioned in one of his last books, “The Well and the Shadows”: “Some year ago I had published a review of G. K. C.’s ‘Catholic Church and Conversion,’ in which I drew attention to what I considered a stylistic defect, his mania for alliteration. He seems to have remembered it during the intervening years, and doing me the honor to couple my name with that of Mr. T. S. Eliot wrote as follows,
“‘It must be a terrible strain on the presence of mind to be always ready with a synonym. I can imagine Mr. T. S. Eliot just stopping himself in time and saying, ‘Waste not, require not.’ I like to think of Mr. Cuthbert Wright having the self-control to cry, ‘Time and fluctuation wait for no man.’ I can imagine his delicate accent when speaking of a pig in a receptacle or of bats in the campanile.”
Professor Roman Dyboski of Krakow, Poland, was first drawn to Chesterton when he read some articles in the “Illustrated London News,” and some passages from his historical poem, “The Ballad of the White Horse.” The professor suggested his advanced students making a special study on the author, and the result was two Polish books on G. K. C. Soon translations of Chesterton’s works became fairly numerous in Poland. His play “Magic” had several successful runs on Polish stages, and the Polish Radio popularized “The Man Who Was Thursday” in a dramatic version.
Shortly after his visit to Poland early in 1927, Chesterton sent Dr. Dyboski an introduction to a collective volume of studies by Polish scholars written to commemorate the Seventh Hundred Anniversary of the death of St. Francis of Assisi, and the services of the Franciscans to civilization.
On July 7, 1927, Chesterton spoke on Poland at the Essex Hall in the Strand. Crowds of his admirers were present; the late Cardinal Bourne himself appeared on the platform; the Polish Ambassador took the chair; Hilaire Belloc moved the vote of thanks which was seconded by Dyboski. The first part of the address struck all present as the most illuminating English opinion that had ever been expressed on Poland,
“I am to speak on Poland, a country very unfamiliar to the average English person. In order to facilitate approach to the subject, let me begin by saying that Poland is Poland. This is the kind of statement which, when I make it, is of course called a paradox (Laughter). Yet what I wish to express is something quite plain and simple. Those of you who have studied medieval history, may remember the ancient kingdom of Bohemia—situated, according to Shakespeare, by the sea-side—now you hear much of Czechoslovakia, unknown to you before. Again, those of you who are old enough to remember the World War, will recall the fervent admiration which we all felt for the heroism of the Servian nation: now we often hear the name of Yugoslavia, which we never heard in those days. As for Poland, she is now known by the same name which she bore through centuries, when she was a great power in Europe, and by which our fathers knew her to exist in those days when she had disappeared from the map, yet continued to live as a nation and to struggle for freedom. That is why I begin by saying that Poland is Poland, and submit that as a fundamental fact for you to consider before we go further.”
It is difficult to imagine more eloquent and emphatic words of recognition for the continuity of Poland’s national tradition through eight centuries of recorded independent existence, through a century and more of division and captivity, and into the dawn of reunion and regained liberty. Chesterton, who in these words as well as in various poems and essays, always acknowledged in Poland one of the corner-stones of the historical structure of European civilization, remained a faithful friend of Poland to his death.
“Grey Beards at Play,” a book of poems in the Mark Twain tradition with G. K.’s own illustrations, first impressed the philosopher L. E. Gilson. But the book which remains with him as the most stimulating is “Orthodoxy,” “When it came out I hailed it as the best piece of apologetic the century had produced. In a sense all his later works are a variation on the same theme. I was interested in the biography of the conversion of a well known American financial expert whose conversion was brought about by reading in succession Chesterton’s ‘Orthodoxy,’ Fulton Sheen’s ‘God and the Intelligence,’ and Karl Adams’ ‘Spirit of Catholicism.’ I don’t wonder they would convert the Devil if he had a sense of humor, and open mind, and could pray for grace!”