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C. S. Lewis

C. S. Lewis Quotes

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Famous C. S. Lewis Quotes

“There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal.... Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbor is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbor he is holy in almost the same way, for in him also Christ verse latitat - the glorifier and the glorified, Glory Himself, is truly hidden.”

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Author:C. S. Lewis
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“We must sometimes get away from the Authorized Version, if for no other reason, simply because it is so beautiful and so solemn. Beauty exalts, but beauty also lulls. Early associations endear, but they also confuse. Through that beautiful solemnity, the transporting or horrifying realities of which the Book tells may come to us blunted and disarmed, and we may only sigh with tranquil veneration when we ought to be burning with shame, or struck dumb with terror, or carried out of ourselves by ravishing hopes and adorations.”

IfsMayBookSometimesReasonRealityBeautifulOughtBibleShameTerrorVersionsBurningDumbGet AwayAssociationBiblicalSighSolemnAdorationTranquilVenerationLullsSolemnity
Author:C. S. Lewis
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“If they embark on this course the difference between the old and the new education will be an important one. Where the old initiated, the new merely 'conditions'. The old dealt with its pupils as grown birds deal with young birds when they teach them to fly; the new deals with them more as the poultry-keeper deals with young birds- making them thus or thus for purposes of which the birds know nothing. In a word, the old was a kind of propagation-men transmitting manhood to men; the new is merely propaganda.”

IfsKnowsMenKindImportantYoungPurposeCoursesDifferencesDealsTeachConditionsBirdEducationalPropagandaManhoodPupilsKeepersNew DealPropagationPoultry
Book:The Abolition of Man: C.S. Lewis’s Classic Essay on Objective Morality: A Critical Edition by Michael Ward
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“Thus the criminal ceases to be a person, a subject of rights and duties, and becomes merely an object on which society can work. And this is, in principle, how Hitler treated the Jews. They were objects; killed not for ill desert but because, on his theories, they were a disease in society. If society can mend, remake, and unmake men at its pleasure, its pleasure may, of course, be humane or homicidal. The difference is important. But, either way, rulers have become owners.”

IfsMenWayMayPersonsImportantHumanityCoursesDifferencesPleasurePrinciplesRightsSubjectsObjectsDutyTheoryDiseaseIllJewCriminalsCeaseTreatedDesertOwnersRulersHumaneRemakesHomicidalRights And Duties
Author:C. S. Lewis
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“The theory that thought is merely a movement in the brain is, in my opinion, nonsense; for if so, that theory itself would be merely a movement, an event among atoms, which may have speed and direction but of which it would be meaningless to use the words 'true' or 'false'.”

IfsMayUseWould BeReligionBrainOpinionAtheismEventsMovementTheorySpeedNonsenseMeaninglessAtomsTrue Or False
Book:A Mind Awake: An Anthology of C. S. Lewis
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“Never, never pin your whole faith on any human being: not if he is the best and wisest in the whole world. There are lots of nice things you can do with sand; but do not try building a house on it.”

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Book:Mere Christianity: a revised and enlarged edition, with a new introduction, of the three books, The case for Christianity, Christian behaviour, and Beyond personality
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“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.”

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Book:A Mind Awake: An Anthology of C. S. Lewis
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“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.”

IfsMenWayDoeShowsTakenInspirational LifeEvidenceIllHidingShow MeRatsCellarsProvocationIll Tempered
Author:C. S. Lewis
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“It means that though the Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still that she did not know. Her knowledge goes back only to the dawn of Time. But if she could have looked a little further back, into the stillness and darkness before Time began, she would have read there a different incantation. She would have known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, the Table would crack and death itself would work backwards.”

IfsKnowsMeanLittlesStillsDifferentInspirationFaithKnownDarknessMagicWillingVictimTablesCommittedDeeperChristian InspirationalDawnCracksWitchStillnessBackwardsWardrobeTraitorTreacheryNarniaLion Witch WardrobeLion The Witch And The Wardrobe
Book:The Chronicles of Narnia Vol I: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe
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“Whenever you find a man who says he does not believe in a real Right and Wrong, you will find the same man going back on this a moment later. He may break his promise to you, but if you try breaking one to him he will be complaining 'It's not fair' before you can say Jack Robinson.”

IfsMenTryingBelieveMayDoeRealMomentsBreakPromiseFairsComplainingThought ProvokingProvokingNot Fair
Book:A Year with C. S. Lewis: 365 Daily Readings from his Classic Works
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“If anyone would like to acquire humility, I can, I think, tell him the first step. The first step is to realize that one is proud. And a biggish step, too. At least, nothing whatever can be done before it. If you think you are not conceited, it means that you are very conceited indeed.”

IfsThinkingFirstsMeanI CanDoneRealizingStepsHumilityProudAcquireThought ProvokingFirst StepsProvokingConceitedChristian Humility
Book:Joyful Christian
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“When you come to knowing God, the initiative lies on His side. If He does not show Himself, nothing you can do will enable you to find Him. And, in fact, He shows much more of Himself to some people than to others—not because He has favourites, but because it is impossible for Him to show Himself to a man whose whole mind and character are in the wrong condition. Just as sunlight, though it has no favourites, cannot be reflected in a dusty mirror as clearly as in a clean one.”

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Book:A Year with C. S. Lewis: Daily Readings from His Classic Works
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“It is good that the window should be transparent, because the street or garden beyond it is opaque. How if you saw through the garden too? It is no use trying to 'see through' [everything]. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To 'see through' all things is the same as not to see.”

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Author:C. S. Lewis
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