This at least seems to me the main problem for philosophers, and is in a manner the main problem of this book.

How can we contrive to be at once astonished at the world and yet at home in it?
How can this queer cosmic town, with its many-legged citizens, with its monstrous and ancient lamps, how can this world give us at once the fascination of a strange town and the comfort and honour of being our own town?
To show that a faith or a philosophy is true from every standpoint would be too big an undertaking even for a much bigger book than this; it is necessary to follow one path of argument; and this is the path that I here propose to follow.

I wish to set forth my faith as particularly answering this double spiritual need, the need for that mixture of the familiar and the unfamiliar which Christendom has rightly named romance.

For the very word "romance" has in it the mystery and ancient meaning of Rome.

Any one setting out to dispute anything ought always to begin by saying what he does not dispute.