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

Author:C. S. Lewis
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 0156027836
Publisher: Mariner Books
Published: 1968-01-01T22:00:00+00:00

4. PRACTISING THE CHRISTIAN LIFE

You never know how much you really believe anything until its truth or falsehood becomes a matter of life and death to you.

A Grief Observed, ch. 2

Do not be scared by the word authority. Believing things on authority only means believing them because you have been told them by someone you think trustworthy. Ninety-nine per cent of the things you believe are believed on authority. I believe there is such a place as New York. I have not seen it myself. I could not prove by abstract reasoning that there must be such a place, I believe it because reliable people have told me so. The ordinary man believes in the Solar System, atoms, evolution, and the circulation of the blood on authority— because the scientists say so. Every historical statement in the world is believed on authority. None of us has seen the Norman Conquest or the defeat of the Armada. None of us could prove them by pure logic as you prove a thing in mathematics. We believe them simply because people who did see them have left writings that tell us about them: in fact, on authority. A man who jibbed at authority in other things as some people do in religion would have to be content to know nothing all his life.

Mere Christianity, bk 2, ch. 5

The moment one asks oneself 'Do I believe?' all belief seems to go. I think this is because one is trying to turn round and look at something which is there to be used and work from— trying to take out one's eyes instead of keeping them in the right place and seeing with them. I find that it happens about other matters as well as faith. In my experience only very robust pleasures will stand the question, 'Am I really enjoying this?' Or attention—the moment I begin thinking about my attention (to a book or a lecture) I have ipso facto ceased attending. St. Paul speaks of 'Faith actualized in Love'. And 'the heart is deceitful'; you know better than I how very unreliable introspection is. I should be much more alarmed about your progress if you wrote claiming to be overflowing with Faith, Hope and Charity.

Letters (27 September 1949)

When Christians say the Christ-life is in them, they do not mean simply something mental or moral. When they speak of being 'in Christ' or of Christ being 'in them', this is not simply a way of saying that they are thinking about Christ or copying Him. They mean that Christ is actually operating through them; that the whole mass of Christians are the physical organism through which Christ acts—that we are His fingers and muscles, the cells of His body.

Mere Christianity, bk 2, ch. 5

How little people know who think that holiness is dull. When one meets the real thing ... it is irresistible. If even ten per cent of the world's population had it, would not the whole world be converted and happy before

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