There is some irony in Belloc’s judgment that Chesterton’s effectiveness was blunted because of his charity. For once, Belloc’s realism broke down, as does the realism of the French break down, from time to time, when faced with some great simplicity. It was Chesterton’s very “weakness” (in Belloc’s eyes) that rendered him the more effective of the two in this one aspect of their work: the polemic against un-realism. Chesterton won by his very simplicity, and by the greatness of his childlike vision—so sane and so just, and so full of good will. Belloc made the enemy mad. He stung them, and they reacted in the most deadly way possible. They ignored him after a time, so that today Belloc remains a writer who has not been tried and found wanting, but who has simply not been tried at all. Possibly Belloc was _too_ effective in his war against the Dons. He made fools of them, and then he insisted on rubbing it in. There is an essay in _Hills and the Sea_ called “The Roman Road.” It is like many of Belloc’s essays: first there is a bathing from the springs of something _in being_, which is soaked into the author’s substance through his senses. Then he brings his intellect to bear on whatever it is that has engaged his whole personality, and some judgment is passed. Frequently, the judgment is moral in character. In this particular essay, Belloc relates the story of a ride he took on his horse “Monster” over the old road which presents “an eternal example” of what Rome could do. ... That sign of Roman occupation, the modern word “Cold Harbour,” is scattered up and down it. There are Roman pavements on it. It goes plumb straight for miles, and at times, wherever it crosses undisturbed land, it is three or four feet above the level of the down. Here then, was a feast for the learned: since certainly the more obvious a thing is, the more glory there must be in denying it ... just as they will deny that Austerlitz was fought in spite of Trafalgar, or that the Gospel of Saint John is the Gospel of Saint John.