# The canvasser as the host who raises the lowest guest

Commentary on Orthodoxy by G. K. Chesterton.

On [CH07.P031](https://glosses.org/orthodoxy/pg16769-r1/CH07.P031/#char=1052,1073): "Friend, go up higher."

The words reproduce Luke 14:10 in the King James Version (first published 1611; inspected here in its modern-spelling Gutenberg transcription and the Bible Gateway text). Jesus observes guests choosing places of honour at a meal and advises taking the lowest place, so that the host may invite one upward. Verse 11 gives the reversal its principle: self-exaltation brings abasement, humility exaltation. The following instruction tells hosts to invite people unable to repay them, including the poor (14:12–14). [Luke 14:7–14](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+14%3A7-14&version=KJV).

Chesterton makes an electoral worker play the host: instead of allowing the assertive to monopolize public life, the canvasser invites an overlooked person into civic importance. This is an application of the Gospel's reversal of status, not a biblical command to conduct elections or evidence that voting originated in Christianity. His final joke preserves the other half of the saying: whoever elevates the modest must also practice humility. The canvasser cannot borrow the host's beneficence while claiming personal superiority over the voter.

## Sources

- [Luke 14:7–14, King James Version](https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Luke+14%3A7-14&version=KJV), Verses 7–11, especially 10; compare 12–14

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