In his book Orthodoxy, while describing his reasons for accepting Christianity and the Church, Chesterton writes that he does so "…because the thing has not merely told this truth or that truth, but has revealed itself as a truth-telling thing." He means that the Church has not incidentally pronounced certain truths but rather that it possesses (in this case by divine authority) a perennial instutional credibility which mankind ought to trust whenever it speaks within its proper capacity.