Yancey on Chesterton, Orthodoxy, xvi:
"Where did pleasure come from? After searching alternatives, Chesterton settled on Christianity as the only reasonable explanation for its existence in the world. Moments of pleasure are the remnants washed ashore from the shipwreck, bits of Paradise extended through time. We must hold these relics lightly, and use them with humility and restraint, never seizing them as our entitlements....
Guided by Chesterton, I came to see sex, money, power and sensory pleasures as God's gifts which, in a fallen world, must be handled with care, like explosives. We have lost the untainted innocence of Eden, and now every good thing represents risk as well, holding within it the potential for abuse. Eating becomes gluttony, love becomes lust, and along the way we lose sight of the One who gives us pleasure. The ancients turned good things into idols; we moderns call them addictions. In either case, what ceases to be a servant becomes a tyrant."
