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C. S. Lewis Quotes

Novelist

C. S. Lewis was a British novelist, academic, and Christian theologian. He is renowned for his fictional works, particularly The Chronicles of Narnia, a series of fantasy novels that have become a beloved classic of children's literature. Lewis also penned adult fiction, including the science fiction trilogy Out of the Silent Planet and the space trilogy. His non-fiction works, such as Mere Christianity and The Problem of Pain, have had a significant impact on Christian thought and spirituality.

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All Ifs Men Thinking People World Knows Christian May Doe Want Giving Religion Real Inspirational Made Mean Said Way Has Beens Mere

Famous C. S. Lewis Quotes

“The basic proposal of the new education is to be that dunces and idlers must not be made to feel inferior to intelligent and industrious pupils. That would be 'undemocratic.”

Feels Made Would Be Education Intelligent Inferiors Proposal Pupils Industrious Dunces Idlers

Author:C. S. Lewis

“What we have been told is how we men can be drawn into Christ-can become part of that wonderful present which the young Prince of the universe wants to offer to His Father-that present which is Himself and therefore us in Him. It is the only thing we were made for. And there are strange, exciting hints in the Bible that when we are drawn in, a great many other things in Nature will begin to come right. The bad dream will be over: it will be morning.”

Men Want Has Beens Made Dream Young Universe Father Christ Morning Wonderful Strange Future Offers Exciting Great Men Over It Hints Bad Dream

Book:Mere Christianity

Source: Mere Christianity

“Of course all children's literature is not fantastic, so all fantastic books need not be children's books. It is still possible, even in an age so ferociously anti-romantic as our own, to write fantastic stories for adults: though you will usually need to have made a name in some more fashionable kind of literature before anyone will publish them.”

Needs Writing Kind Children Made Stills Book Stories Age Courses Literature Names Adults Fantastic Publish Fashionable Children's Books Children's Literature

Book:On Stories: And Other Essays on Literature

Source: On Stories: And Other Essays on Literature

“Friends are seldom found; they are made.”

Made Found

Author:C. S. Lewis

“We have discovered that the scheme of 'outlawing war' has made war more like an outlaw without making it less frequent and that to banish the knight does not alleviate the suffering of the peasant.”

Doe Made War Suffering Schemes Knights Peasants Outlaw Alleviate

Book:The Oxford History of English Literature

Source: The Oxford History of English Literature

“If our deepest desires cannot be satisfied in this world, then we must have been made for another world.”

Ifs World Has Beens Made Desire This World Satisfied Another World

Author:C. S. Lewis

“It takes all sorts to make a world; or a church. This may be even truer of a church. If grace perfects nature it must expand all our natures into the full richness of the diversity which God intended when He made them, and Heaven will display far more variety than Hell.”

Ifs World May Made Heaven Church Hell Grace Diversity Variety Display Richness

Book:Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer

Source: Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer

“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.”

Made Fall Interest Events Wall Falling In Love Bounds Massive Appetite Centre Triviality Personal Happiness

Book:The Four Loves

Source: The Four Loves

“Thirst was made for water; inquiry for truth. What you now call the free play of inquiry has neither more nor less to do with the ends for which intelligence was given you than masturbation has to do with marriage.”

Made Ends Play Given Water Thirst Inquiry Masturbation Free Play

Author:C. S. Lewis

“I never exactly made a book. It's rather like taking dictation. I was given things to say.”

Writing Made Book Given Dictation

Author:C. S. Lewis

“Why should your majesty think it? My own plans are made. While I may, I sail East in Dawn Treader. When she fails me, I row East in my coracle. When that sinks, shall I paddle East with my four paws. Then, when I can swim no longer, if I have not yet reached Aslan's Country, there shall I sink with my nose to the sunrise... and Peepiceek will be head of Talking Mice in Narnia”

Ifs Thinking Should May Made I Can Country My Own Talking Four Plans Failing East Noses Dawn Swim Sail Sunrise Mice Majesty Paws Narnia

Author:C. S. Lewis

“But now I discovered the wonderful power of wine. I understood why men become drunkards. For the way it worked on me was not at all that it blotted out these sorrows, but that it made them seem glorious and noble, like sad music, and I somehow great and revered for feeling them.”

Men Way Made Feelings Seems Wonderful Sorrow Understood Wine Noble Glorious Drunkards Sad Music Till We Have Faces

Author:C. S. Lewis

“The mold in which a key is made would be a strange thing, if you had never seen a key: and the key itself a strange thing if you had never seen a lock. Your soul has a curious shape because it is a hollow made to fit a particular swelling in the infinite contours of the divine substance, or a key to unlock one of the doors in the house with many mansions. Your place in heaven will seem to be made for you and you alone, because you were made for it -- made for it stitch by stitch as a glove is made for a hand.”

“Aravis also had many quarrels (and, I'm afraid, even fights) with Cor, but they always made it up again: so that years later, when they were grown up, they were so used to quarrelling and making it up again that they got married so as to go on doing it more conveniently.”

Years Made Used Fighting Goes On Married Made It Quarrels

Author:C. S. Lewis

“He died not for men, but for each man. If each man had been the only man made, He would have done no less.”

Ifs Men Made Done Religion Died

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

Source: A Mind Awake: An Anthology of C. S. Lewis

“He thinks great folly, child,' said Aslan. "This world is bursting with life for these few days because the song with which I called it into life still hangs in the air and rumbles in the ground. It will not be so for long. But I cannot tell that to this old sinner, and I cannot comfort him either; he has made himself unable to hear my voice. If I spoke to him, he would hear only growlings and roarings. Oh, Adam's son, how cleverly you defend yourself against all that might do you good!”

Ifs Thinking World Children Long Made Said Stills Might Song Voice Air This World Son Comfort Folly Sinner Spokes Adam Roaring Bursting Rumble Growling

Author:C. S. Lewis

“It was a full moon and, shining on all the snow, it made everything almost as bright as day -- only the shadows were rather confusing.”

Made Moon Shadow Shining Snow Confusing Wardrobe Full Moon Lion Witch Wardrobe Lion The Witch And The Wardrobe

Book:The Chronicles of Narnia Vol I: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Source: The Chronicles of Narnia Vol I: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

“Peter did not feel very brave; indeed, he felt he was going to be sick. But that made no difference to what he had to do.”

Feels Made Religion Felt Differences Sick Brave Peter Narnia

Book:The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

Source: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe

“When the police arrived and found no lion, no broken wall, and no convicts, and the Head behaving like a lunatic, there was an inquiry into the whole thing. And in the inquiry all sorts of things about Experiment House came out, and about ten people got expelled. After that, the Head's friends saw that the Head was no use as a Head, so they got her made an Inspector to interfere with other Heads. And when they found she wasn't much good even at that, they got her into Parliament where she lived happily ever after.”

People Made Whole Use Found House Saws Broken Wall Ten Police Experiments Lions Interfere Inquiry Parliament Lunatic Happily Ever After Ever After Convicts Inspectors

Author:C. S. Lewis

“For in Calormen, story-telling (whether the stories are true or made up) is a thing you're taught, just as English boys and girls are taught essay-writing. The difference is that people want to hear the stories, whereas I never heard of anyone who wanted to read the essays.”

People Want Writing Made Stories Wanted Girl Differences Boys Heard Taught Essays Boy And Girl Essay Writing

Book:The Chronicles of Narnia Vol V: The Horse and his Boy

Source: The Chronicles of Narnia Vol V: The Horse and his Boy

“You must therefore zealously guard in his mind the curious assumption 'My time is my own'. Let him have the feeling that he starts each day as the lawful possessor of twenty-four hours. Let him feel as a grievous tax that portion of this property which he has to make over to him employers, and as a generous donation that further portion which h allows to religious duties. But what he must never be permitted to doubt is that the total from which these deductions have been made was, in some mysterious sense, his own personal birthright.”

“We have made men proud of most vices, but not of cowardice. Whenever we have almost succeeded in doing so, God permits a war or an earthquake or some other calamity, and at once courage becomes so obviously lovely and important even in human eyes that all our work is undone, and there is still at least one vice of which they feel genuine shame. The danger of inducing cowardice in our patients, therefore, is lest we produce real self-knowledge and self-loathing, with consequent repentance and humility.”

“Few men looked on her without becoming, in a certain fashion, her lovers. But it was the kind of love that made them not less true, but truer, to their own wives.”

Men Kind Made Certain Wife Fashion Becoming Lovers Kinds Of Love

Author:C. S. Lewis

“God made us: invented us as a man invents an engine. A car is made to run on petrol, and it would not run properly on anything else. Now God designed the human machine to run on Himself. He Himself is the fuel our spirits were designed to burn, or the food our spirits were designed to feed on. There is no other. That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there.”

Men Way Giving Humans Made Running Spirit Car Machines Asking Bother Fuel Engines Religion God Petrol Asking God

Book:The Complete C. S. Lewis Signature Classics

Source: The Complete C. S. Lewis Signature Classics

“The more we let God take us over, the more truly ourselves we become - because He made us. He invented us. He invented all the different people that you and I were intended to be. . .It is when I turn to Christ, when I give up myself to His personality, that I first begin to have a real personality of my own.”

People Giving Firsts Made Different Real Religion Turns Christ My Own Personality Giving Up New Beginnings Different Peoples

Author:C. S. Lewis

“Not my idea of God, but God. Not my idea of H., but H. Yes, and also not my idea of my neighbour, but my neighbour. For don't we often make this mistake as regards people who are still alive -- who are with us in the same room? Talking and acting not to the man himself but to the picture -- almost the précis -- we've made of him in our own minds? And he has to depart from it pretty widely before we even notice the fact.”

People Men Mind Made Stills Ideas Facts Rooms Acting Mistake Talking Alive Regard Neighbour

Book:A Grief Observed

Source: A Grief Observed

“Human beings look separate because you see them walking about separately. But then we are so made that we can see only the present moment. If we could see the past, then of course it would look different. For there was a time when every man was part of his mother, and (earlier still) part of his father as well, and when they were part of his grandparents. If you could see humanity spread out in time, as God sees it, it would look like one single growing thing--rather like a very complicated tree. Every individual would appear connected with every other.”

“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.”

Ifs Way Feels Wells Long Made I Can Feelings Might Action Certain Can Do Goes On Promise Hungry Cease Commit Being True Beloved Headache

Book:Mere Christianity

Source: Mere Christianity

“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.”

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

“Oh, I can see it happening, age after age, and growing worse the more you reveal your beauty: the son turning his back on the mother and the bride on her groom, stolen away by this everlasting calling, calling, calling of the gods. Taken where we can't follow. It would be far better for us if you were foul and ravening. We'd rather you drank their blood than stole their hearts. We'd rather they were ours and dead than yours and made immortal.”