Background Image
The Ancient Man Approached God (or Even The Gods)as The Accused Person Approaches His Judge. For The Modern Man The Roles Are Reversed. He Is The Judge: God Is In The Dock. He Is Quite A Kindly Judge: If God Should Have A Reasonable Defense For Being The God Who Permits War, Poverty, And Disease, He Is Ready To Listen To It. The Trial May Even End In God's Acquittal. But The Important Thing Is That Man Is On The Bench And God Is In The Dock.
-C. S. Lewis
Please Wait....
Translating....

The Ancient Man Approached

C. S. Lewis
The Ancient Man Approached God (or Even The Gods)as The Accused Person Approaches His Judge. For The Modern Man The Roles Are Reversed. He Is The Judge: God Is In The Dock. He Is Quite A Kindly Judge: If God Should Have A Reasonable Defense For Being The God Who Permits War, Poverty, And Disease, He Is Ready To Listen To It. The Trial May Even End In God's Acquittal. But The Important Thing Is That Man Is On The Bench And God Is In The Dock.
Views: 4
Topic
War
Men
Should Have
More From C. S. Lewis
Many A Man, Brought Up In The Glib Profession Of Some Shallow Form Of Christianity, Who Comes Through Reading Astronomy To Realize For The First Time How Majestically Indifferent Most Reality Is To Man, And Who Perhaps Abandons His Religion On That Account, May At That Moment Be Having His First Genuinely Religious Experience.
Religious
Reading
Reality
The Castle Of Cair Paravel On Its Little Hill Towered Up Above Them; Before Them Were The Sands, With Rocks And Little Pools Of Salt Water, And Seaweed, And The Smell Of The Sea And Long Miles Of Bluish-green Waves Breaking For Ever And Ever On The Beach. And Oh, The Cry Of The Seagulls! Have You Ever Heard It? Can You Remember?
Beach
Sea
Waves Breaking
Now The Story Of Christ Is Simply A True Myth: A Myth Working On Us The Same Way As The Others, But With This Tremendous Difference That It Really Happened: And One Must Be Content To Accept It In The Same Way, Remembering That It Is God’s Myth Where The Others Are Men’s Myths: I.e., The Pagan Stories Are God Expressing Himself Through The Minds Of Poets, Using Such Images As He Found There, While Christianity Is God Expressing Himself Through What We Call 'real Things'.
Real
Men
Differences
The Long, Dull, Monotonous Years Of Middle-aged Prosperity Or Middle-aged Adversity Are Excellent Campaigning Weather For The Devil.
Adversity
Years
Weather
I See You Are An Idiot, Whatever Else You May Be.
May
Idiot
Lion Witch Wardrobe
If Christianity Was Something We Were Making Up, Of Course We Could Make It Easier. But It Is Not. We Cannot Compete, In Simplicity With People Who Are Inventing Religions. How Could We? We Are Dealing With Fact. Of Course Anyone Can Be Simple If He Has No Facts To Bother About.
Simple
People
Simplicity
Puddleglum,' They've Said, 'you're Altogether Too Full Of Bobance And Bounce And High Spirits. You've Got To Learn That Life Isn't All Fricasseed Frogs And Ell Pie. You Want Something To Sober You Down A Bit. We're Only Saying It For Your Own Good, Puddleglum.' That's What They Say. Now A Job Like This --a Journey Up North Just As Winter's Beginning Looking For A Prince That Probably Isn't There, By Way Of Ruined City Nobody's Ever Seen-- Will Be Just The Thing. If That Doesn't Steady A Chap, I Don't Know What Will.
Jobs
Winter
Journey
It Still Remains True That No Justification Of Virtue Will Enable A Man To Be Virtuous.
Wisdom
Men
Virtue
We Have Not, In Fact, Proved That Science Excludes Miracles: We Have Only Proved That The Question Of Miracles, Like Innumerable Other Questions, Excludes Laboratory Treatment.
Miracle
Facts
Treatment
Lust Is A Poor, Weak, Whimpering, Whispering Thing Compared With That Richness And Energy Of Desire Which Will Arise When Lust Has Been Killed.
Inspirational
Religious
Lust
If We Let Ourselves, We Shall Always Be Waiting For Some Distraction Or Other To End Before We Can Really Get Down To Our Work. The Only People Who Achieve Much Are Those Who Want Knowledge So Badly That They Seek It While The Conditions Are Still Unfavorable. Favorable Conditions Never Come.
Inspirational
Learning
People
Being Nice Doesn’t Make You Stupid. It Makes You Feel Good Because You Know You Are Gracious Enough To Forgive And Smart Enough To Realize How Distasteful Some People Can Be.
Nice
Smart
Stupid
Morality, Like Numinous Awe, Is A Jump; In It, Man Goes Beyond Anything That Can Be 'given' In The Facts Of Experience.
Men
Facts
Morality
To Fight In Another Man's Armour Is Something More Than To Be Influenced By His Style Of Fighting.
Fighting
Men
Style
A Man Who First Tried To Guess 'what The Public Wants,' And Then Preached That As Christianity Because The Public Wants It, Would Be A Pretty Mixture Of Fool And Knave
Men
Religion
Would Be
Walking And Talking Are Two Very Great Pleasures, But It Is A Mistake To Combine Them. Our Own Noise Blots Out The Sounds And Silences Of The Outdoor World; And Talking Leads Almost Inevitably To Smoking, And Then Farewell To Nature As Far As One Of Our Senses Is Concerned. The Only Friend To Walk With Is One Who So Exactly Shares Your Taste For Each Mood Of The Countryside That A Glance, A Halt, Or At Most A Nudge, Is Enough To Assure Us That The Pleasure Is Shared.
Philosophy
Mistake
Farewell
You Can Be Good For The Mere Sake Of Goodness; You Cannot Be Bad For The Mere Sake Of Badness. You Can Do A Kind Action When You Are Not Feeling Kind And When It Gives You No Pleasure, Simply Because Kindness Is Right; But No One Ever Did A Cruel Action Simply Because Cruelty Is Wrong - Only Because Cruelty Is Pleasant Or Useful To Him, In Other Words, Badness Cannot Succeed Even In Being Bad In The Same Way In Which Goodness Is Good. Goodness Is, So To Speak, Itself: Badness Is Only Spoiled Goodness. And There Must Be Something Good First Before It Can Be Spoiled.
Kindness
Giving
Feelings
A Voice Had Begun To Sing. It Was Very Far Away And Digory Found It Hard To Decide From What Direction It Was Coming. Sometimes It Seemed To Come From All Directions At Once. Sometimes He Almost Thought It Was Coming Out Of The Earth Beneath Them. Its Lower Notes Were Deep Enough To Be The Voice Of The Earth Herself. There Were No Words. It Was Hardly A Tune. But It Was Beyond Comparison, The Most Beautiful Sound He Had Ever Heard.
Beautiful
Voice
Nephew
The Longest Way Round Is The Shortest Way Home
Home
Way
Rounds
You Can't Go Against The Grain Of The Universe And Not Expect To Get Splinters.
Splinters
Grain
Universe
...we Sacrifice Other Species To Our Own Not Because Our Own Has Any Objective Metaphysical Privilege Over Others, But Simply Because It Is Ours. It May Be Very Natural To Have This Loyalty To Our Own Species, But Let Us Hear No More From The Naturalists About The "sentimentality" Of Anti-vivisectionists. If Loyalty To Our Own Species - Preference For Man Simply Because We Are Men - Is Not Sentiment, Then What Is?
Loyalty
Sacrifice
Men
You Cannot Make Men Good By Law.
Men
Law
What Began The Change Was The Very Writing Itself. Let No One Lightly Set About Such A Work. Memory, Once Waked, Will Play The Tyrant.
Memories
Writing
Play
One Always Feel Better When One Has Made Up One's Mind.
Feel Better
Mind
Made
Most Of Us Are Not Really Approaching The Subject In Order To Find Out What Christianity Says; We Are Approaching It In The Hope Of Finding Support From Christianity For The Views Of Our Own Party.
Party
Views
Order
For Every One Pupil Who Needs To Be Guarded Against A Weak Excess Of Sensibility There Are Three Who Need To Be Awakened From The Slumber Of Cold Vulgarity. The Task Of The Modern Educator Is Not To Cut Down Jungles But To Irrigate Deserts.
Cutting
Tasks
Three
No Christian And, Indeed, No Historian Could Accept The Epigram Which Defines Religion As 'what A Man Does With His Solitude.'
Christian
Men
Solitude
Yes, Pride Is A Perpetual Nagging Temptation. Keep On Knocking It On The Head, But Don't Be Too Worried About It. As Long As One Knows One Is Proud, One Is Safe From The Worst Form Of Pride.
Pride
Long
Temptation
Life With God Is Not Immunity From Difficulties, But Peace In Difficulties.
Difficulty
Immunity
A Sign Of A Culture That Has Lost Its Faith - Moral Collapse Follows Upon Spiritual Collapse.
Spiritual
Culture
Moral
There Is Hope For A Man Who Has Never Read Malory Or Boswell Or Tristam Shandy Or Shakespeare's Sonnets: But What Can You Do With A Man Who Says He "has Read" Them, Meaning He Has Read Them Once, And Thinks That This Settles The Matter?
Men
Thinking
Matter
Of Course God Does Not Consider You Hopeless. If He Did He Would Not Be Moving You To Seek Him (and He Obviously Is). What Is Going On In You At Present Is Simply The Beginning Of The Treatment. Continue Seeking With Cheerful Seriousness. Unless He Wanted You, You Would Not Be Wanting Him.
Wanted
Seeking God
Seriousness
I Have Been Feeling Very Much Lately That Cheerful Insecurity Is What Our Lord Asks Of Us.
Feelings
Insecurity
Cheerful
Isn't It Funny How Day By Day Nothing Changes, But When You Look Back, Everything Is Different.
Inspirational
Life
Change
The Happiness Which God Designs For His Higher Creatures Is The Happiness Of Being Freely, Voluntarily United To Him And To Each Other In An Ecstasy Of Love And Delight Compared With Which The Most Rapturous Love Between A Man And A Woman On This Earth Is Mere Milk And Water. And For That They Must Be Free.
Men
Water
Design
All Names Will Soon Be Restored To Their Proper Owners.
Names
Owners
Lion The Witch And The Wardrobe
Remember That All Worlds Draw To An End And That Noble Death Is A Treasure Which No One Is Too Poor To Buy.
Noble
World
Treasure
It Is A Happy Moment When Our Desire Crosses With The Will Of Heavenly Father.
Father
Desire
Moments
A Christian Is Not Someone Who Never Goes Wrong, But One Who Is Enabled To Repent And Pick Himself Up And Begin Again, Because The Christ-life Is Inside Him.
Christian
Life Is
Begin Again
Sometimes It Is Hard Not To Say, 'god Forgive God.' Sometimes It Is Hard To Say So Much. But If Our Faith Is True, He Didn't. He Crucified Him.
Forgiving
Sometimes
God Forgives
I Sometimes Wonder Whether All Pleasures Are Not Substitutes For Joy.
Inspirational
Joy
Sometimes
How Incessant And Great Are The Ills With Which A Prolonged Old Age Is Replete.
Age
Aging
Incessant
In Each Of My Friends There Is Something That Only Some Other Friend Can Fully Bring Out. By Myself I Am Not Large Enough To Call The Whole Man Into Activity; I Want Other Lights Than My Own To Show All His Facets... Hence True Friendship Is The Least Jealous Of Loves. Two Friends Delight To Be Joined By A Third, And Three By A Fourth, If Only The Newcomer Is Qualified To Become A Real Friend. They Can Then Say, As The Blessed Souls Say In Dante, "here Comes One Who Will Augment Our Loves." For In This Love "to Divide Is Not To Take Away.
Real
Blessed
Jealous
When We Are Lost In The Woods, The Sight Of A Signpost Is A Great Matter.
Sight
Woods
Matter
Yes, I Know,' Interrupted Puddleglum. 'and Few Return To The Sunlit Lands. You Needn't Say It Again. You Are A Chap Of One Idea, Aren't You?
Land
Ideas
Return
The Full Acting Out Of The Self's Surrender To God Therefore Demands Pain: This Action, To Be Perfect, Must Be Done From The Pure Will To Obey, In The Absence, Or In The Teeth, Of Inclination
Pain
Self
Perfect
Youth And Age Touch Only The Surface Of Our Lives.
Age
Youth
Surface
The Unhistorical Are Usually, Without Knowing It, Enslaved To A Fairly Recent Past.
Past
Knowing
Recent Past
Don't Say It Was Delightful; Make Us Say Delightful When We've Read The Description. You See, All Those Words (horrifying, Wonderful, Hideous, Exquisite) Are Only Like Saying To Your Readers Please Will You Do The Job For Me.
Jobs
Writing
Wonderful
You Can't Just Go On Being A Good Egg. You Must Either Hatch Or Go Bad!
Eggs
Goes On
A Thing May Be Morally Neutral And Yet The Desire For That Thing May Be Dangerous.
Desire
May
Dangerous
Beloved," Said The Glorious One, "unless Thy Desire Had Been For Me Thou Wouldst Not Have Sought So Long And So Truly. For All Find What They Truly Seek.
Long
Desire
Beloved
The State Exists Simply To Promote And To Protect The Ordinary Happiness Of Human Beings In This Life. A Husband And Wife Chatting Over A Fire, A Couple Of Friends Having A Game Of Darts In A Pub, A Man Reading A Book In His Own Room Or Digging In His Own Garden-that Is What The State Is There For. And Unless They Are Helping To Increase And Prolong And Protect Such Moments, All The Laws, Parliaments, Armies, Courts, Police, Economics, Etc., Are Simply A Waste Of Time.
Couple
Husband
Book
This Is Where Men, Even The Trustiest, Fail Us. Their Heart Is Never So Wholly Given To Any Matter But That Some Trifle Of A Meal, Or A Drink, Or A Sleep, Or A Joke, Or A Girl, May Come In Between Them And It, And Then (even If You Are A Queen) You'll Get No More Good Out Of Them Until They've Had Their Way.
Girl
Queens
Heart
The Christian Idea Of 'putting On Christ' Is The Whole Of Christianity.
Christian
Ideas
Whole
He Is Not The Soul Of Nature, Nor Any Part Of Nature. He Inhabits Eternity: He Dwells In A High And Holy Place: Heaven Is His Throne, Not His Vehicle, Earth Is His Footstool, Not His Vesture. One Day He Will Dismantle Both And Make A New Heaven And Earth. He Is Not To Be Identified Even With The 'divine Spark' In Man. He Is 'god And Not Man.
Men
Heaven
Soul
And In Truth (as I Now See) I Had The Wish To Put Off My Journey As Long As I Could. Not For Any Peril Or Labour It Might Cost; But Because I Could See Nothing In The Whole World For Me To Do Once It Was Accomplished. As Long As This Act Lay Before Me, There Was, As It Were, Some Barrier Between Me And The Dead Desert Which The Rest Of My Life Must Be.
Journey
Long
Wish
But Why,... If You Have A Serious Comment To Make On The Real Life Of Men, Must You Do It By Talking About A Phantasmagoric Never-never Land Of Your Own? Because, I Take It, One Of The Main Things The Author Wants To Say Is That The Real Life Of Men Is Of That Mythical And Heroic Quality.
Real
Men
Talking
If You Look For Truth, You May Find Comfort In The End; If You Look For Comfort You Will Not Get Either Comfort Or Truth Only Soft Soap And Wishful Thinking To Begin, And In The End, Despair.
Truth
Live Life
Thinking
If We Did Not Bring To The Examinations Of Our Instincts A Knowledge Of Their Comparative Dignity We Could Never Learn It From Them.
Wisdom
Examination
Dignity
Your Real, New Self (which Is Christ's And Also Yours, And Yours Just Because It Is His) Will Not Come As Long As You Are Looking For It. It Will Come When You Are Looking For Him.
Real
Self
Long
Language Exists To Communicate Whatever It Can Communicate. Some Things It Communicates So Badly That We Never Attempt To Communicate Them By Words If Any Other Medium Is Available.
Language
Communicate
Mediums
While We Are Actually Subjected To Them, The 'moods' And 'spirits' Of Nature Point No Morals. Overwhelming Gaiety, Insupportable Grandeur, Sombre Desolation Are Flung At You. Make What You Can Of Them, If You Must Make At All. The Only Imperative That Nature Utters Is, 'look. Listen. Attend.
Nature
Looks
Spirit
A Little Lie Is Like A Little Pregnancy It Doesn't Take Long Before Everyone Knows.
Christian
Lying
Pregnancy
But The Most Obvious Fact About Praise — Whether Of God Or Anything — Strangely Escaped Me. I Thought Of It In Terms Of Compliment, Approval, Or The Giving Of Honor. I Had Never Noticed That All Enjoyment Spontaneously Overflows Into Praise Unless (sometimes Even If) Shyness Or The Fear Of Boring Others Is Deliberately Brought In To Check It.
Player
Thinking
Games
Always Winter But Never Christmas.
Christmas
Winter
Lion The Witch And The Wardrobe
We Thought The Duke Would Have Been Pleased If The King's Majesty Would Have Married His Daughter, But Nothing Came Of That--' Squints, And Has Freckles,' Said Caspian. Oh, Poor Girl,' Said Lucy.
Girl
Daughter
Kings
We Are Born Helpless. As Soon As We Are Fully Conscious We Discover Loneliness.
Loneliness
Conscious
Born
Faith In Christ Is The Only Thing To Save You From Despair.
Inspirational
Despair
Christ
The Church Exists For Nothing Else But To Draw Men Into Christ.
Men
Church
Christ
The Real Oxford Is A Close Corporation Of Jolly, Untidy, Lazy, Good-for-nothing Humorous Old Men, Who Have Been Electing Their Own Successors Ever Since The World Began And Who Intend To Go On With It. They'll Squeeze Under The Revolution Or Leap Over It When The Time Comes, Don't You Worry.
Real
Humorous
Men
Badness Cannot Succeed Even In Being Bad In The Same Way In Which Goodness Is Good. Goodness Is, So To Speak, Itself: Badness Is Only Spoiled Goodness. Evil Is A Parasite, Not An Original Thing.
Evil
Catholic
Way
'being In Love' First Moved Them To Promise Fidelity: This Quieter Love Enables Them To Keep The Promise.
Inspirational
Being In Love
Promise
It's All Love Or Sex These Days. Friendship Is Almost As Quaint And Outdated A Notion As Chastity. Soon Friends Will Be Like The Elves And The Pixies - Fabulous Mythical Creatures From A Distant Past.
Friendship
Sex
Past
To Get Even Near Humility, Even For A Moment, Is Like A Drink Of Cold Water To A Man In A Desert.
Humility
Men
Water
Total War Is The Most Humane In The Long Run.
Running
War
Long
The Calormens Have Dark Faces And Long Beards. They Wear Flowing Robes And Orange-colored Turbans, And They Are A Wise, Wealthy, Courteous, Cruel And Ancient People. They Bowed Most Politely To Caspian And Paid Him Long Compliments All About The Fountains Of Prosperity Irrigating The Gardens Of Prudence And Virtue --and Things Like That-- But Of Course What They Wanted Was The Money They Had Paid.
Wise
Dark
Garden
Man Has Got To Take Charge Of Man.... Then Real Education, Including Pre-natal Education. By Real Education I Mean One That Has No 'take-it-or-leave-it' Nonsense. A Real Education Makes The Patient What It Wants Infallibly: Whatever He Or His Parents Try To Do About It. Of Course, It'll Have To Be Mainly Psychological At First. But We'll Get On To Biochemical Conditioning Int He End And Direct Manipulation Of The Brain.
Education
Real
Mean
If One Could Run Without Getting Tired I Don't Think One Would Often Want To Do Anything Else.
Running
Tired
Thinking
All The Delights Of Sense, Or Heart, Or Intellect, With Which You Could Once Have Tempted Him, Even The Delights Of Virtue Itself, Now Seem To Him In Comparison But As The Half Nauseous Attractions Of A Raddled Harlot Would Seem To A Man Who Hears That His True Beloved Whom He Has Loved All His Life And Whom He Had Believed To Be Dead Is Alive And Even Now At His Door.
Heart
Men
Doors
Most Of Us Know What We Should Expect To Find In A Dragon's Lair, But, As I Said Before, Eustace Had Read Only The Wrong Books. They Had A Lot To Say About Exports And Imports And Governments And Drains, But They Were Weak On Dragons.
Book
Government
Dragons
Believe In God Like You Believe In The Sunrise. Not Because You Can See It, But Because You Can See All It Touches.
Believe
Sunrise
Like You
God Is No Fonder Of Intellectual Slackers Than Of Any Other Slackers. If You Are Thinking Of Becoming A Christian, I Warn You You Are Embarking On Something Which Is Going To Take The Whole Of You, Brains And All.
Christian
Thinking
Intellectual
I Wonder If People Who Asked For God To Intervene In Our World, Really Know What They Are Asking. Will They Want To Be There When God Really Does Intervene?
Our World
People
Doe
Most Of Us, I Suppose, Have A Secret Country But For Most Of Us It Is Only An Imaginary Country. Edmund And Lucy Were Luckier Than Other People In That Respect.
Country
People
Secret
The Human Heart Is Not Unchanging (nay, Changes Almost Out Of Recognition In The Twinkling Of An Eye).
Heart
Eye
Recognition
And The Seriousness With Which The Other Party Takes My Words Always Raises The Doubt Whether I Have Taken Them Seriously Enough Myself.
Party
Taken
Doubt
Jewel,' He Said, 'what Lies Before Us? Horrible Thoughts Arise In My Heart. If We Had Died Before Today We Should Have Been Happy.
Lying
Heart
Jewels
When They Have Really Learned To Love Their Neighbours As Themselves, They Will Be Allowed To Love Themselves As Their Neighbours.
Screwtape Letters
Neighbour
I Have Come," Said A Deep Voice Behind Them. They Turned And Saw The Lion Himself, So Bright And Real And Strong That Everything Else Began At Once To Look Pale And Shadowy Compared With Him.
Strong
Real
Voice
By Repenting, One Acknowledges Them As Sins-therefore Not To Be Repeated.
Sin
Repent
Acknowledge
The Promise, Made When I Am In Love And Because I Am In Love, To Be True To The Beloved As Long As I Live, Commits Me To Being True Even If I Cease To Be In Love. A Promise Must Be About Things That I Can Do, About Actions: No One Can Promise To Go On Feeling In A Certain Way. He Might As Well Promise To Never Have A Headache Or Always To Feel Hungry.
Long
Feelings
Promise
You Never Know What You Can Do Until You Try, And Very Few Try Unless They Have To.
Trying
Knows
Can Do
A Myth Is A Lie That Conveys A Truth.
Truth
Lying
Myth
What One Must Not Do Is To Rule Out The Supernatural As The One Impossible Explanation.
Impossible
Explanation
Ambition! We Must Be Careful What We Mean By It. If It Means The Desire To Get Ahead Of Other People - Which Is What I Think It Does Mean - Then It Is Bad. If It Means Simply Wanting To Do A Thing Well, Then It Is Good. It Isn't Wrong For An Actor To Want To Act His Part As Well As It Can Possibly Be Acted, But The Wish To Have His Name In Bigger Type Than The Other Actors Is A Bad One.
Ambition
Mean
Thinking
Christ Did Not Die For Man Because They Were Intrinsically Worth Dying For, But Because He Is Intrinsically Love, And Therefore Loves Infinitely.
Men
Miracle
Dying
Children Are Not Deceived By Fairy-tales; They Are Often And Gravely Deceived By School-stories. Adults Are Not Deceived By Science-fiction ; They Can Be Deceived By The Stories In The Women's Magazines.
Children
School
Adults
Clearly One Must Read Every Good Book At Least Once Every Ten Years.
Book
Years
Good Book
Aslan's Instructions Always Work; There Are No Exceptions.
Instruction
Exception
I Didn’t Go To Religion To Make Me Happy. I Always Knew A Bottle Of Port Would Do That. If You Want A Religion To Make You Feel Really Comfortable, I Certainly Don’t Recommend Christianity.
Christian Inspirational
Religion
Bottles
We Have Not Long To Live In Any Event. Let Us Spend What Is Left In Seeking The Unpeopled World Behind The Sunrise.
Long
Sunrise
Events
If We Let Ourselves, We Shall Always Be Waiting For Some Distraction Or Other To End Before We Can Really Get Down To Our Work.
Waiting
Distraction
Ends
We Must Meet Children As Equals In That Area Of Our Nature Where We Are Their Equals...the Child As Reader Is Neither To Be Patronized Nor Idolized: We Talk To Him As Man To Man.
Children
Men
Reader
It Is In The Process Of Being Worshipped That God Communicates His Presence To Men.
Men
Worship
Process
Friendship Is The Greatest Of Worldly Goods. Certainly To Me It Is The Chief Happiness Of Life.
Life Happiness
Chiefs
Goods
Very Often The Only Way To Get A Quality In Reality Is To Start Behaving As If You Had It Already.
Reality
Quality
Way
I Have Seen Great Beauty Of Spirit In Some Who Were Great Sufferers. I Have Seen Men, For The Most Part, Grow Better Not Worse With Advancing Years, And I Have Seen The Last Illness Produce Treasures Of Fortitude And Meekness From Most Unpromising Subjects.
Men
Years
Treasure
Gratitude Exclaims, Very Properly, 'how Good Of God To Give Me This.'
Gratitude
Giving
Give Me
One Of The Marks Of A Certain Type Of Bad Man Is That He Cannot Give Up A Thing Himself Without Wanting Every One Else To Give It Up. That Is Not The Christian Way. An Individual Christian May See Fit To Give Up All Sorts Of Things For Special Reasons--marriage, Or Meat, Or Beer, Or The Cinema; But The Moment He Starts Saying The Things Are Bad In Themselves, Or Looking Down His Nose At Other People Who Do Use Them, He Has Taken The Wrong Turning.
Christian
Giving Up
Taken
A Cold, Self-righteous Prig Who Goes Regularly To Church May Be Far Nearer To Hell Than A Prostitute.
Self
Church
May
Pride Gets No Pleasure Out Of Having Something, Only Out Of Having More Of It Than The Next Man.
Humility
Pride
Men
The Value Of The Individual Does Not Lie In Him. He Receives It By Union With Christ.
Lying
Doe
Unions
I Have Often Repented Of Speech But Hardly Ever Of Silence.
Silence
Speech
Aim At Heaven And You Will Get Earth Thrown In. Aim At Earth And You Get Neither.
Motivational
Godly
Christian Inspirational
I Have At Last Come To The End Of The Faerie Queene: And Though I Say "at Last", I Almost Wish He Had Lived To Write Six Books More As He Had Hoped To Do — So Much Have I Enjoyed It.
Book
Writing
Wish
The Most Deeply Compelled Action Is Also The Freest Action. By That I Mean, No Part Of You Is Outside The Action.
Mean
Action
Compelled
[the Difference Between The Old And The New Education Being] In A Word, The Old Was A Kind Of Propagation-men Transmitting Manhood To Men; The New Is Merely Propaganda.
Men
Differences
Kind
I Now See That I Spent Most Of My Life In Doing Neither What I Ought Nor What I Liked.
Screwtape Letters
Ought
You Are Certainly Under The Guidance Of The Holy Ghost Or You Wouldn't Have Come Where You Now Are.
Ghost
Guidance
Holy
The Human Mind Is Generally Far More Eager To Praise And Dispraise Than To Describe And Define. It Wants To Make Every Distinction A Distinction Of Value; Hence Those Fatal Critics Who Can Never Point Out The Differing Quality Of Two Poets Without Putting Them In An Order Of Preference As If They Were Candidates For A Prize.
Order
Two
Mind
God, Who Foresaw Your Tribulation, Has Specially Armed You To Go Through It, Not Without Pain But Without Stain.
Inspirational
Pain
Stains
Our Souls Demand Purgatory, Don't They? Would It Not Break The Heart If God Said To Us, It Is True, My Son, That Your Breath Smells And Your Rags Drip With Mud And Slime, But We Are Charitable Here And No One Will Upbraid You With These Things, Nor Draw Away From You. Enter Into Joy? Should We Not Reply, With Submission, Sir, And If There Is No Objection, I'd Rather Be Cleansed First. It May Hurt, You Know-even So, Sir.
Hurt
Heart
Son
Forgiving And Being Forgiven Are Two Names For The Same Thing. The Important Thing Is That A Discord Has Been Resolved.
Inspirational
Names
Two
The Cross Comes Before The Crown And Tomorrow Is A Monday Morning!
Monday
Morning
Crowns
When You Are Behaving As If You Loved Someone, You Will Presently Come To Love Him. If You Injure Someone You Dislike, You Will Find Yourself Disliking Him More. If You Do Him A Good Turn, You Will Find Yourself Disliking Him Less.
Finding Yourself
Turns
Ifs
If You Find That The Reader Of Popular Romances--however Uneducated A Reader, However Bad The Romances--goes Back To His Old Favourites Again And Again, Then You Have Pretty Good Evidence That They Are To Him A Sort Of Poetry.
Romance
Evidence
Reader
Of All Bad Men Religious Bad Men Are The Worst.
Inspirational
Religious
Men
The Sin Both Of Men And Of Angels, Was Rendered Possible By The Fact That God Gave Us Free Will.
Angel
Men
Facts
Well,' Said Ransom, 'if It Is A Delusion, It's A Pretty Stubborn One.
Stubborn
Ransom
Well Said
...the Sun Looks Down On Nothing Half So Good As A Household Laughing Together Over A Meal, Or Two Friends Talking Over A Pint Of Beer, Or A Man Alone Reading A Book That Interests Him..." - C.s. Lewis: Weight Of Glory
Book
Reading
Beer
I Have Discovered, Passionate Grief Does Not Link Us With The Dead But Cuts Us Off From Them. This Becomes Clearer And Clearer. It Is Just At Those Moments When I Feel Least Sorrow - Getting Into My Morning Bath Is Usually One Of Them - That H. Rushes Upon My Mind In Her Full Reality, Her Otherness. Not, As In My Worst Moments, All Foreshortened And Patheticized And Solemnized By My Miseries, But As She Is In Her Own Right. This Is Good And Tonic.
Morning
Grief
Cutting
We Know Nothing Of Religion Here: We Only Think Of Christ.
Thinking
Christ
Knows
It Is Funny How Mortals Always Picture Us As Putting Things Into Their Minds: In Reality Our Best Work Is Done By Keeping Things Out.
Reality
Mind
Done
Almost Certainly God Is Not In Time. His Life Does Not Consist Of Moments One Following Another...ten-thirty-- And Every Other Moment From The Beginning Of The World--is Always Present For Him. If You Like To Put It This Way, He Has All Eternity In Which To Listen To The Split Second Of Prayer Put Up By A Pilot As His Plane Crashes In Flames.
Prayer
Flames
Doe
Do Not Be Deceived, Wormwood. Our Cause Is Never More In Danger Than When A Human, No Longer Desiring, But Still Intending, To Do Our Enemy's Will, Looks Round Upon A Universe From Which Every Trace Of Him Seems To Have Vanished, And Asks Why He Has Been Forsaken, And Still Obeys.
Enemy
Looks
Letters
Be Good, Sweet Maid, And Don't Forget That This Involves Being As Clever As You Can.
Sweet
Clever
Maids
Every Age Has Its Own Outlook. It Is Specially Good At Seeing Certain Truths And Specially Liable To Make Certain Mistakes. We All, Therefore, Need The Books That Will Correct The Characteristic Mistake Of Our Own Period. And That Means The Old Books.
Mistake
Book
Mean
Remember He Is The Artist And You Are Only The Picture. You Can't See It. So Quietly Submit To Be Painted---i.e., Keep Fulfilling All The Obvious Duties Of Your Station (you Really Know Quite Well Enough What They Are!), Asking Forgiveness For Each Failure And Then Leaving It Alone.you Are In The Right Way. Walk---don't Keep On Looking At It.
Trust
Artist
Leaving
Hell Is A State Of Mind -- Ye Never Said A Truer Word. And Every State Of Mind, Left To Itself, Every Shutting Up Of The Creature Within The Dungeon Of Its Own Mind -- Is, In The End, Hell. But Heaven Is Not A State Of Mind. Heaven Is Reality Itself. All That Is Fully Real Is Heavenly.
Real
Heaven
Mind
In Our World," Said Eustace, "a Star Is A Huge Ball Of Flaming Gas." Even In Your World, My Son, That Is Not What A Star Is, But Only What It Is Made Of.
Stars
Son
Our World
There Was Nothing Medieval People Liked Better, Or Did Better, Than Sorting Out And Tidying Up. Of All Our Modern Inventions I Suspect That They Would Most Have Admired The Card Index.
People
Sorting Out
Cards
All That Is Not Eternal Is Eternally Out Of Date.
Wisdom
Eternity
Childishness
She Looked At A Silver Birch: It Would Have A Soft, Showery Voice And Would Look Like A Slender Girl, With Hair Blown All About Her Face And Fond Of Dancing. She Looked At The Oak: He Would Be A Wizened, But Hearty, Old Man With A Frizzled Beard And Warts On His Fact And Hands, With Hair Growing Out Of The Warts. She Looked At The Beech Under Which She Was Standing. Ah! --she Would Be The Best Of All. She Would Be A Gracious Goddess, Smooth And Stately, The Lady Of The Wood.
Girl
Men
Hair
God Whispers In Our Pleasures, But Shouts In Our Pain.
Pain
Pleasure
Pain And Pleasure
There Is Something Which Unites Magic And Applied Science (technology) While Separating Them From The "wisdom" Of Earlier Ages. For The Wise Men Of Old, The Cardinal Problem Of Human Life Was How To Conform The Soul To Objective Reality, And The Solution Was Wisdom, Self-discipline , And Virtue. For The Modern, The Cardinal Problem Is How To Conform Reality To The Wishes Of Man, And The Solution Is A Technique.
Wise
Reality
Men
Well!' Said Puddleglum, Rubbing His Hands. 'this Is Just What I Needed. If These Chaps Don't Teach Me To Take A Serious View Of Life, I Don't Know What Will.
Views
Hands
Serious
But All Night, Aslan And The Moon Gazed Upon Each Other With Joyful And Unblinking Eyes.
Eye
Moon
Night
Christianity Does Not Want Us To Reduce By One Atom The Hatred We Feel For Cruelty And Treachery. We Ought To Hate Them. Not One Word Of What We Have Said About Them Needs To Be Unsaid. But It Does Want Us To Hate Them In The Same Way In Which We Hate Things In Ourselves: Being Sorry That The Man Should Have Done Such Things, And Hoping, If It Is Anyway Possible, That Somehow, Sometime, Somewhere He Can Be Cured And Made Human Again.
Sorry
Hate
Men
It Is By Human Avarice Or Human Stupidity, Not By The Churlishness Of Nature, That We Have Poverty And Overwork.
Stupidity
Poverty
Humans
I'm Not Sure God Wants Us To Be Happy. I Think He Wants Us To Love, And Be Loved. But We Are Like Children, Thinking Our Toys Will Make Us Happy And The Whole World Is Our Nursery. Something Must Drive Us Out Of That Nursery And Into The Lives Of Others, And That Something Is Suffering.
Children
Thinking
Suffering
Thus, And Not Otherwise, The World Was Made. Either Something Or Nothing Must Depend On Individual Choices.
Individual Choice
Choices
World
You're A Mere Chick. I Remember You When You Were A Egg. Don't Come Trying To Teach Me, Sir. Crabs And Crumpets!
Remember You
Remembers You
Eggs
I Never See Why We Should Do Anything Unless It Is Either A Duty Or A Pleasure! Life's Short Enough Without Filling Up Hours Unnecessarily
Filling Up
Hours
Enough
Suppose... Suppose We Have Only Dreamed And Made Up These Things Like Sun, Sky, Stars, And Moon, And Aslan Himself. In That Case, It Seems To Me That The Made-up Things Are A Good Deal Better Than The Real Ones. And If This Black Pits Of A Kingdom Is The Best You Can Make, Then It's A Poor World. And We Four Can Make A Dream World To Lick Your Real One Hollow.
Dream
Stars
Real
We Come To Scripture Not To Learn A Subject But To Steep Ourselves In A Person.
Scripture
Persons
Subjects
The Thing Is To Rely On God. The Time Will Come When You Will Regard All This Misery As A Small Price To Pay For Having Been Brought To That Dependence. Meanwhile, The Trouble Is That Relying On God Has To Begin All Over Again Every Day As If Nothing Has Yet Been Done.
God
Done
Pay
There Have Been Men Before Who Got So Interested In Proving The Existence Of God That They Came To Care Nothing For God Himself, As If The Good Lord Had Nothing To Do But To Exist. There Have Been Some Who Were So Preoccupied With Spreading Christianity That They Never Gave A Thought To Christ.
Men
Care
Christianity
That World Is Ended, As If It Had Never Been. Let The Race Of Adam And Eve Take Warning.
Race
Warning
World
If I Find In Myself A Desire Which No Experience In This World Can Satisfy, The Most Probable Explanation Is That I Was Made For Another World.
Inspirational
Life
Spiritual
The Great Thing With Unhappy Times Is To Take Them Bit By Bit, Hour By Hour, Like An Illness. It Is Seldom The Present, The Exact Present, That Is Unbearable.
Unhappy
Unbearable
Illness
Quarrelling Means Trying To Show That The Other Man Is In The Wrong. (and) There Is No Sense In Trying To Do That Unless You And He Had Some Sort Of Agreement As To What Righ And Wrong Are.
Mean
Men
Trying
This Is My Endlessly Recurrent Temptation: To Go Down To That Sea, And There Neither Dive Nor Swim Nor Float, But Only Dabble And Splash, Careful Not To Get Out Of My Depth And Holding On To The Lifeline Which Connects Me With My Things Temporal.
Sea
Temptation
Swim
Thirty Was So Strange For Me. I've Really Had To Come To Terms With The Fact That I Am Now A Walking And Talking Adult.
Birthday
Talking
Age
Though No One Would Want To Be Sold As A Slave, It Is Perhaps Even More Galling To Be A Sort Of Utility Slave Whom No One Will Buy.
Want
Slave
Utility
The Longest Way Round Is The Shortest Way Home. (quoting Alexander Maclaren, The Wearied Christ And Other Sermons)
Home
Way
Christ
The Whole Difficulty Of Understanding Hell Is That The Thing To Be Understood Is So Nearly Nothing.
Inspirational
Religious
Understanding
Love Is Unselfishly Choosing For Another's Highest Good.
Love
Relationship Advice
Highest
Is Any Pleasure On Earth As Great As A Circle Of Christian Friends?
Christian
Circles
Earth
When He [god] Talks Of Their Losing Their Selves, He Means Only Abandoning The Clamour Of Self-will; Once They Have Done That, He Really Gives Them Back All Their Personality, And Boasts (i Am Afraid, Sincerely) That When They Are Wholly His They Will Be More Themselves Than Ever.
Mean
Self
Giving
The Human Mind Is Generally Far More Eager To Praise Or Dispraise Than It Is To Describe And Define.
Mind
Praise
Humans
That's The Worst Of Girls," Said Edmund To Peter And The Dwarf. "they Never Can Carry A Map In Their Heads." "that's Because Our Heads Have Something Inside Them," Said Lucy.
Girl
Dwarves
Maps
Peter, High King Of Narnia," Said Aslan. "shut The Door.
Kings
Doors
Narnia
The Scotch Catechism Says That Man's Chief End Is 'to Glorify God And Enjoy Him Forever.' But We Shall Then Know That These Are The Same Thing. Fully To Enjoy Is To Glorify. In Commanding Us To Glorify Him, God Is Inviting Us To Enjoy Him.
Men
Scotch
Forever
To Love At All Is To Be Vulnerable.
Love
Inspirational
Vulnerable
If They Are Wrong They Need Your Prayers All The More; And If They Are Your Enemies, Then You Are Under Orders To Pray For Them. That Is One Of The Rules Common To The Whole House.
Prayer
Order
House
Surely What A Man Does When He Is Taken Off Guard Is The Best Evidence For What Sort Of Man He Is. If There Are Rats In A Cellar, You Are Most Likely To See Them If You Go In Very Suddenly. But The Suddenness Does Not Create The Rats; It Only Prevents Them From Hiding. In The Same Way The Suddenness Of The Provocation Does Not Make Me Ill Tempered; It Only Shows Me What An Ill-tempered Man I Am.
Inspirational Life
Taken
Men
Pure, Spiritual, Intellectual Love Shot Form Their Faces Like Barbedlightning. It Was So Unlike The Love We Experience That Its Expressioncould Easily Be Mistaken For Ferocity.
Spiritual
Intellectual
Faces
The Event Of Falling In Love... In One High Bound It Has Overleaped The Massive Wall Of Our Selfhood; It Has Made Appetite Itself Altruistic, Tossed Personal Happiness Aside As A Triviality And Planted The Interests Of Another In The Centre Of Our Being.
Falling In Love
Wall
Events
In Your Life You Meet People. Some You Never Think About Again. Some, You Wonder What Happened To Them. There Are Some That You Wonder If They Ever Think About You. And Then There Are Some That You Wish You Never Have To Think About Again. But You Do.
Thinking
People
Wish
If We Ignore It The Truth That God Is Love May Slyly Come To Mean For Us The Converse, That Love Is God.
Mean
Love Is
May
Getting Over A Painful Experience Is Much Like Crossing Monkey Bars. You Have To Let Go At Some Point In Order To Move Forward.
Inspirational
Change
Inspiring
She Stepped Out From Among Their Shifting Confusion Of Lovely Lights And Shadows. A Circle Of Grass, Smooth As A Lawn, Met Her Eyes, With Dark Trees Dancing All Around It. And Then --oh Joy! For He Was There: The Huge Lion, Shining White In The Moonlight, With His Huge Black Shadow Underneath Him.
Eye
Dark
Light
Excess Of Love, Did Ye Say? There Was No Excess, There Was Defect. She Loved Her Son Too Little, Not Too Much. If She Had Loved Him More There'd Be No Difficulty.
Son
Excess
Littles
No, I Don’t Wish I Knew Heaven Was Like The Picture In My Great Divorce, Because, If We Knew That, We Should Know It Was No Better. The Good Things Even Of This World Are Far Too Good Ever To Be Reached By Imagination. Even The Common Orange, You Know: No One Could Have Imagined It Before He Tasted It. How Much Less Heaven.
Divorce
Orange
Imagination
You Have Not Chosen One Another, But I Have Chosen You For One Another.
Chosen One
Chosen
Christian Friends
And The Whole Forest Would Give Itself Up To Jollification For Weeks On End.
Giving
Forests
Week
No One Ever Told Me That Grief Felt So Like Fear. I Am Not Afraid, But The Sensation Is Like Being Afraid. The Same Fluttering In The Stomach, The Same Restlessness, The Yawning. I Keep On Swallowing. At Other Times It Feels Like Being Mildly Drunk, Or Concussed. There Is A Sort Of Invisible Blanket Between The World And Me. I Find It Hard To Take In What Anyone Says. Or Perhaps, Hard To Want To Take It In. It Is So Uninteresting. Yet I Want The Others To Be About Me. I Dread The Moments When The House Is Empty. If Only They Would Talk To One Another And Not To Me.
Fear
Grief
Yawning
He Wants Them To Learn To Walk And Must Therefore Take Away His Hand.
Hands
Want
Screwtape Letters
'useful,' And 'necessity' Was Always 'the Tyrant's Plea'.
Freedom
Tyrants
Liberty
Much Is Expected From Those To Whom Much Is Given.
Given
Philanthropy Giving
Expected
Afflictions Are... If We Can So Take Them, Our Share In The Passion Of Christ
Passion
Affliction
Christ
Giving To The Poor Is An Essential Part Of Christian Morality.
Christian
Giving
Essentials
The Man Is A Humbug — A Vulgar, Shallow, Self-satisfied Mind, Absolutely Inaccessible To The Complexities And Delicacies Of The Real World. He Has The Journalist's Air Of Being A Specialist In Everything, Of Taking In All Points Of View And Being Always On The Side Of The Angels: He Merely Annoys A Reader Who Has The Least Experience Of Knowing Things, Of What Knowing Is Like. There Is Not Two Pence Worth Of Real Thought Or Real Nobility In Him. But He Isn't Dull.
Real
Angel
Men
The Value Of Myth Is That It Takes All The Things You Know And Restores To Them The Rich Significance Which Has Been Hidden By The Veil Of Familiarity.
Veils
Rich
Myth
The Difference [god's] Timelessness Makes Is That This Now (which Slips Away From You Even As You Say The Word Now) Is For Him Infinite.
Differences
Infinite
Away From You
We Can Never Know What Might Have Been But What Is To Come Is Another Matter Entirely
Meaningful
Future
Past
Every Time You Make A Choice You Are Turning The Central Part Of You, The Part Of You That Chooses, Into Something A Little Different From What It Was Before. And Taking Your Life As A Whole, With All Your Innumerable Choices, All Your Life Long You Are Slowly Turning This Central Thing Either Into A Heavenly Creature Or Into A Hellish Creature...
Motivational
Choices
Different
It's Like The Sound Of A Chuckle In The Darkness. The Sense That Some Shattering And Disarming Simplicity Is The Real Answer.
Real
Simplicity
Darkness
The Divine Nature Wounds And Perhaps Destroys Us Merely By Being What It Is.
Divine
Divine Nature
Wounds
Understanding Quotes: Their Essence and Application

Quotes, or quotations, are powerful tools in communication, encapsulating ideas, emotions, and wisdom in concise expressions. They serve various purposes across different contexts, from academic writing to everyday conversation.

1. Defining Quotes

A quote is a repetition of someone else's statement or thoughts. It can be a direct replication of words spoken or written by another individual, often used to support arguments, provide evidence, or convey profound insights.


2. The Importance of Quotes

2.1. Enhancing Credibility

Incorporating quotes from authoritative sources can bolster the credibility of your work. By referencing experts or primary sources, you demonstrate thorough research and a solid foundation for your arguments.


2.2. Providing Evidence

Quotes serve as concrete evidence to support claims. In academic and professional writing, they validate points made, offering readers a basis to trust the information presented.


2.3. Conveying Emotions and Perspectives

Quotes can encapsulate emotions and perspectives succinctly. They allow writers to express complex feelings or viewpoints through the words of others, often more eloquently than paraphrasing.


3. Types of Quotes

3.1. Direct Quotes

Direct quotes involve copying the exact words from a source, enclosed in quotation marks. They are used when the original wording is significant or particularly well-expressed.


3.2. Indirect Quotes (Paraphrasing)

Indirect quotes restate the original message in your own words. While not enclosed in quotation marks, they still require proper attribution to the original source.


3.3. Block Quotes

Block quotes are lengthy direct quotations, formatted as a separate block of text. They are typically used for quotes exceeding a certain length, varying by citation style. For instance, in APA style, quotes longer than 40 words are formatted as block quotes.



4. Proper Usage of Quotes


4.1. Contextual Relevance

Ensure that the quote you choose is relevant to the topic and adds value to your content. Avoid inserting quotes solely for decorative purposes.


4.2. Integration into Your Writing

Seamlessly integrate quotes into your writing. Introduce them appropriately and follow up with analysis or commentary to connect them to your main points.


4.3. Attribution and Citation

Always attribute quotes to their original authors and provide proper citations according to the required style guide (APA, MLA, Chicago, etc.).


5. Common Mistakes to Avoid


5.1. Overusing Quotes

Relying too heavily on quotes can overshadow your voice. Use them sparingly to support your arguments, not replace them.


5.2. Lack of Analysis

Presenting a quote without analysis or explanation can leave readers questioning its relevance. Always follow up with your interpretation or discussion.


5.3. Misquoting or Taking Out of Context

Ensure that quotes are accurate and not taken out of context, as this can mislead readers and undermine your credibility.



6. Quotes in Different Contexts


6.1. Academic Writing

In academic writing, quotes are used to support arguments, provide evidence, and engage with existing literature. Proper citation is crucial to avoid plagiarism.


6.2. Journalism

Journalists use quotes to provide firsthand accounts, add authenticity, and present multiple perspectives within a story.


6.3. Literature and Creative Writing

In literature, quotes can be used to convey character voices, themes, and stylistic elements. They enrich narratives and provide depth to storytelling.



7. Punctuation and Formatting


Understanding the correct punctuation and formatting of quotes is essential:


Quotation Marks: Always enclose direct quotes within quotation marks.


Punctuation Placement: In American English, periods and commas are placed inside quotation marks, while colons and semicolons are placed outside.


Block Quotes: For longer quotes, format them as block quotes without quotation marks, and indent the entire block.



8. Ethical Considerations


Ethical use of quotes involves accurate representation, proper attribution, and respect for intellectual property. Misuse can lead to plagiarism, which carries serious academic and professional consequences.

9. Tools for Managing Quotes


Utilize tools like citation generators and plagiarism checkers to manage quotes effectively. These tools help ensure proper formatting and originality in your writing.



Conclusion


Quotes are invaluable in enriching content, providing evidence, and conveying complex ideas succinctly. When used appropriately, they enhance the quality and credibility of your writing. Always ensure relevance, proper integration, and ethical usage to maximize their impact.


Trending Author
Lucille Ball
Ron Livingston
Hugh Kingsmill
Jackie Chan
Bob Casey, Jr.
Michelle Shocked
Category
Information