Perelandra {III}

"And now the experiences of the past day and night began to make a direct assault upon his faith... It was all very well to talk of Maledil: but where was Maledil now?... Knowledge remained an abstraction. Mere bigness and loneliness overbore him."

Remember Lewis' definition of faith: "The art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods." Bad days happen. Sometimes several bad days happen in a row. It's easy to forget what we once knew when all we feel is loneliness or depression.

"Say a child's prayer if you can't say a man's."

 "There was, no doubt, a confusion of persons in damnation... they were melted down into their Master, as a lead soldier slips down and loses his shape in the ladle held over the gas ring." 

This is a horrible (and probably accurate) conception of Hell... elsewhere in Mere Christianity and The Screwtape Letters Lewis has expressed his opinion that, "Sameness is to be found most among the most "natural" men, not among those who surrender to Christ. How monotonously alike all the great tyrants and conquerors have been," and that the goal of the devils is to devour and consume humanity. Real personality, real individuality can only be found in Christ.

Perelandra {II}

"Were all the things which appeared as mythology on earth scattered throughout other worlds as realities?" 

This betrays Lewis' great love of myth, and the fact that myth led him to a belief in Christianity makes this sentence intriguing to me.

Thinking about when Ransom is drenched with "an ice-cold shower bath," that brings to his mind the phrase, "die of a rose in aromatic pain," I think it represents baptism.

"Such was the refreshment that he seemed to himself to have been, till now, but half-awake. When he opened his eyes... all the colours about him seemed richer and the dimness of that world seemed clarified... The golden beast at his side seemed no longer either a danger or a nuisance." 

It's cool to think of baptism in that way.

Ransom christens the trees, just as Adam was charged with naming all the creatures in the Garden of Eden.

Interesting thought:

"This itch to have things over again, as if life were a film that could be unrolled twice or even made to work backwards... was it possibly the root of all evil? No: of course the love of money was called that. But money itself - perhaps one valued it chiefly as a defence against chance, a security for being able to have things over again, a means of arresting the unrolling of the film."

Perelandra {I}

In Perelandra, Ransom "described us as being in a state of siege, as being, in fact, an enemy-occupied territory, held down by eldils who were at war both with us and with the eldils of "Deep Heaven," or "space."" This is the exact same term that Lewis used in Mere Christianity when he said, ""Enemy-occupied territory—that is what this world is." :)

Of the fallen eldila - "Oh, they'll put all sorts of things into your head if you let them," said Ransom lightly. "The best plan is to take no notice and keep straight on. Don't try to answer them. They like drawing you into an interminable argument." This is both like and unlike the devils of The Screwtape Letters. Screwtape advised Wormwood that their best work was sometimes done keeping things out rather than putting things into the heads of mortals. However, I feel that there is still a similarity between the tempting eldila and the devils.

"If you mean, Does my reason accept the view that he will (accidents apart) deliver me safe on the surface of Perelandra? - the answer is Yes," said Ransom. "If you mean, Do my nerves and my imagination respond to this view? - I'm afraid the answer is No. One can believe is anesthetics and yet feel in a panic when they actually put the mask over your face. I think I feel as a man who believes in the future life feels when he is taken out to face a firing party. Perhaps it's good practice." This is very much like what Lewis said in Mere Christianity - "Faith... is the art of holding on to things your reason has once accepted, in spite of your changing moods."

Miracles {II}

Again, I would like to start by giving part of a definition of miracles that comes from my church:

"Christianity is founded on the greatest of all miracles, the resurrection of our Lord. If that be admitted, other miracles cease to be improbable."

C.S. Lewis starts chapter XIV by promoting a different miracle as the greatest of all:

"The central miracle asserted by Christians is the Incarnation. They say that God became Man. Every other miracle prepares for this, or exhibits this, or results from this." 

However, I think that the two are similar enough that Lewis' discussion will still hold some jewels of merit for us. Lewis maintains that miracles are not "arbitrary interferences" or "disconnected raids", but

"the various steps of a strategically coherent invastion - an invasion which intends complete conquest and "occupation." The fitness, and therefore credibility, of the particular miracles depends on their relation to the Grand Miracle; all discussion of them in isolation from it is futile."

In other words, all miracles are in some way connected to the condescension of God. Lewis would I think definitely agree with the last sentence of the LDS definition given above: "If that [the resurrection] be admitted, other miracles cease to be improbable."

Mere Christianity [book III, ch. 8 - book IV, ch. 7]

Main points: Lewis discusses pride, charity, hope as desire for a better country, faith as holding on despite changing moods, and faith as it works with good acts to bring about salvation once we have accepted that we can do nothing. He discusses the nature of God, and how His aim is to make us into new creatures. 

The Great Sin

The seminal work in LDS culture on the topic of pride is Ezra Taft Benson's talk, Beware of Pride. I went through this talk and looked for similarities to my favourite quotes by Lewis on the same subject. 


Lewis: "Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind."
Benson: "Our will in competition to God’s will allows desires, appetites, and passions to go unbridled... Our enmity toward God takes on many labels, such as rebellion, hard-heartedness, stiff-neckedness, unrepentant, puffed up, easily offended, and sign seekers."


Lewis: "Pride is competitive by its very nature: that is why it goes on and on."
Benson: "Pride is essentially competitive in nature. We pit our will against God’s. When we direct our pride toward God, it is in the spirit of “my will and not thine be done.”"


Lewis: "Pride always means enmity—it is enmity. And not only enmity between man and man, but enmity to God."
Benson: "The central feature of pride is enmity—enmity toward God and enmity toward our fellowmen. Enmity means “hatred toward, hostility to, or a state of opposition.” It is the power by which Satan wishes to reign over us."

The Screwtape Letters

The Screwtape Letters is one of my all-time favourite books. Lewis' mastery of irony works to great effect in persuading the reader to take a second look at themselves. At times stinging, frequently profound, this is a book unmatched by others and in a category all it's own. Advice from one devil to another? Pure genius.


Some favourite quotes:

IV
"They constantly forget... that they are animals and that whatever their bodies do affects their souls."
"Keep them watching their own minds and trying to produce feelings there by the action of their own wills. When they mean to ask Him for charity, let them, instead, start trying to manufacture charitable feelings for themselves and not to notice that this is what they are doing. When they meant to pray for courage, let them really be trying to feel brave. When they say they are praying for forgiveness, let them be trying to feel forgiven."
{IV always make me reconsider my prayer habits...}

VI
"Do what you will, there is going to be some benevolence, as well as some malice, in your patient's soul. The great thing is to direct the malice to his immediate neighbours whom he meets every day and to thrust his benevolence out to the remote circumference, to people he does not know. The malice thus becomes wholly real and the benevolence largely imaginary."

VIII
"It is during such trough periods, much more than during the peak periods, that it is growing into the sort of creature He wants it to be... He wants them to learn to walk and must therefore take away His hand; and if only the will to walk is really there He is pleased even with their stumbles. 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."