Lord, I Believe
Delight is naturally kindled by delight and God, who loves his children’s love, delights in their delighting. How, then, is he disposed towards the causes of unwholesome sadness? The flame of happiness would run and spread, but for the obstacles my words and acts and attitudes oppose to it. How then is God disposed towards these acts and attitudes of mine? Does not he detest them? And what is the fate of things which earn the detestation of almighty love? Is it not that they should be abolished? God’s hatred or wrath is, indeed, nothing but this, a simple desire for the abolition of its object; it is not, like mine, a passion. Surely, then, God’s will is set to wither the tentacles of my unkindness, when they are twisted round my neighbor’s throat.
He strikes at my unkindness, I tell myself, and not at me; he hates the sin, but loves the sinner. Here is a saying which must be true in substance, if there is to be any hope for sinful men; yet it is misleading and dangerous, if it suggests to me that my sin is not myself, but somehow detachable. For this is what Satan most wishes me to believe, and commonly makes me believe. According to Satan, and according to me, my sins occur during moral holidays, when my sober, working self is off the job. If he finds me gullible enough, the devil even tells me that I am not really involved at all, my sin is not the act even of a holiday self; it is a play of moral mice harmlessly tolerated, while I, the lordly cat, pretend to be asleep.
Austin Farrer (1904–1968)—Doctor of Divinity and fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, and later warden of Keble College, Oxford, Austin Farrer was a member of the Inklings, a literary discussion group that included C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien. Farrer was one of the witnesses at the civil marriage ceremony of C. S. Lewis and Joy Davidman, and he preached the sermon at Joy’s funeral.
Revelations of Divine Love
Often I wondered why, in the great foreseeing wisdom of God, the beginning of sin was not hindered, for then, I thought, all would have been well. Then the Lord spoke, “Sin has a part to play, but all shall be well”
After this the Lord reminded me of the longing that I had to him beforehand, and I saw that nothing held me back but sin. Then I looked upon the rest of mankind, and I thought, “If sin had not been, we should all have been clean like our Lord, just as he originally made us.”
Thus, in my folly, I often wondered why the great foreseeing wisdom of God did not prevent sin from entering the world, for then, I thought, all should have been well. However, this line of reasoning only led to mourning and sorrow, not to a solution to the problem, and I should have left it behind.
But Jesus spoke to me all that I needed to understand, and here is what he said, “Sin has a part to play in my plan, but all shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.”
In this naked word, sin, our Lord brought to my mind all that is evil and shameful, and the utter wickedness which he bore for us both in his spirit and his body in the course of his life, passion, and death. All of this was showed me in a moment, for our good Lord did not desire to frighten me at this terrible sight.
So pain endures for a time. Its role is to purge us, make us to know ourselves, and it drives us to the Lord to plead for mercy. The passion of our Lord and the knowledge that his will will indeed be done gives us strength to bear up to all this.
Julian of Norwich (1342–?)—An English Benedictine nun, Julian of Norwich was very ill on May 8–9, 1373, and was visited with sixteen visions of God’s love. She became a recluse and spent twenty years meditating on these visions, after which she wrote the Revelations.
Religious Essays
Sin is the lack of the divine itself, it is not-to-have-God and not-to-wish-to-have-God; it is a very turning away from the Eternal as it reveals and imparts itself; in general terms it is the reluctance of the creature to be drawn to God, and lastly, the “natural man’s” resistance against grace itself.
And thus the battle of the flesh against the spirit, in its highest sense, is determined by entirely different characteristics from those in the third stage. It is the difference between mere “conversion” of the will and the mystical “rebirth” of the soul. This being born again is no longer the active transfer of our will from the realm of inclination into that of obedience. It is, in the sense of the third chapter of the Gospel according to St. John, the conquest of the resistance of the natural man, to … overcome the natural aversion, indeed the horror, against that “entirely other” to which after all he is called. It is the complete giving up of the natural sphere of existence in favor of the divine spiritual, and accordingly the laying oneself open to receive divine grace, salvation, and blessedness itself. It is becoming faithful, and therefore not an act of will. One cannot of one’s self enter upon faith. As has already been said, faith, in the deepest sense of the word, cannot be enjoined, it can only be “kindled,” that is “given.” It is conversio passiva in the scriptural sense: “Convert us, then we are converted” (Lamentations 5:3). And it is only here that the mysterious experience of the redemptive “struggle of conversion” appears, for this does not arise from antipathy to the law, being occasioned rather by the wholly mysterious resistance of the fleshly creature to the dominating, selective, searching, rescuing, forgiving, self-imparting grace of God.
Rudolph Otto (1869–1937)—German Protestant theologian, philosopher, and educator, Otto studied non-Christian religions, focusing particularly on religious experience.
The Green Overcoat
He was turning round irresolutely to seek once again for that Inverness, which he was now more confident than ever was not there, when the Devil, who has great power in these affairs, presented to his eyes, cast negligently over a chair, a GREEN OVERCOAT of singular magnificence.…
Now the Devil during all Professor Higginson’s life had had but trifling fun with him until that memorable moment. The opportunity, as the reader will soon discover, was (from the Devil’s point of view) remarkable and rare. More, far more, than Professor Higginson’s somewhat sterile soul was involved in the issue.
The Green Overcoat appeared for a few seconds seductive, then violently alluring, next—and in a very few seconds—irresistible.
Professor Higginson shot a sin-laden and frightened glance towards the light and the noise and the music within. No one was in sight. Through the open door of the rooms, whence the sound of the party came loud and fairly drunken, he saw no face turned his way. The hall itself was deserted. Then he heard a hurl of wind, a dash of rain on the hall window. With a rapidity worthy of a greater game, and to him most unusual, he whisked the garment from the chair, slipped into the shadow of the door, struggled into the Green Overcoat with a wriggle that seemed to him to last five weeks—it was, as a fact, a conjurer’s trick for smartness—and it was on! The Devil saw to it that it fitted.
Hilaire Belloc (1870–1953)—Belloc was born in Paris, studied at Balliol College, Oxford, and became a British subject in 1906. He served in Parliament and then retired to full-time journalism and writing, during which time he edited several publications and wrote over one hundred works, many devoted to Catholic thought. He was a great friend of G. K. Chesterton’s.
Pensées
The Christian religion, then, teaches men these two truths; that there is a God whom men can know, and that there is a corruption in their nature which renders them unworthy of Him. It is equally important to men to know both these points; and it is equally dangerous for man to know God without knowing his own wretchedness, and to know his own wretchedness without knowing the Redeemer who can free him from it. The knowledge of only one of these points gives rise either to the pride of philosophers, who have known God, and not their own wretchedness, or to the despair of atheists, who know their own wretchedness, but not the Redeemer.
And, as it is alike necessary to man to know these two points, so is it alike merciful of God to have made us know them. The Christian religion does this; it is in this that it consists.
Let us herein examine the order of the world and see if all things do not tend to establish these two chief points of this religion: Jesus Christ is the end of all, and the center to which all tends. Whoever knows Him knows the reason of everything.
Those who fall into error err only through failure to see one of these two things. We can, then, have an excellent knowledge of God without that of our own wretchedness and of our own wretchedness without that of God. But we cannot know Jesus Christ without knowing at the same time both God and our own wretchedness.
The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, the God of Christians, is a God of love and of comfort, a God who fills the soul and heart of those whom He possesses, a God who makes them conscious of their inward wretchedness, and His infinite mercy, who unites Himself to their inmost soul, who fills it with humility and joy, with confidence and love, who renders them incapable of any other end than Himself.
Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)—Philosopher, physicist, mathematician, inventor, and one of the most formidable intellects of seventeenth-century France, Pascal developed the laws of hydraulics and probability and is one of the fathers of the modern computer. His Provincial Letters are considered high French prose, and his Pensées (thoughts) were the beginnings of an apology for the Christian faith. Lewis’s copies of Pascal’s works are heavily annotated.
Sensuality is the faculty of our soul which affects and controls all our bodily reactions, and through which we know and experience the physical creation, both pleasant and unpleasant. It has two functions, one which looks after our physical needs, and one which provides for our physical appetites. It is the one and the same faculty that will grumble when the body is lacking essential requirements, yet when the need is met, will move it to take more than it requires to maintain and further our desires. It grumbles when its likes are not met, and it is highly delighted when they are.
Before man sinned, sensuality was so obedient to will, its master as it were, that it never led it into perverted physical pleasure or pain, or any pretended spiritual pleasure or pain, induced by the enemy of souls into our earthly minds. But it is not so now. Unless it is ruled by grace in the will, so that it is prepared to suffer humbly and wholly the consequences of original sin (which it feels when it is deprived of its wonted pleasures, and can only have those irritating things that are so good for it!), and unless it will control both its strong desires when it has its wonted pleasures, and its greedy delight when the improving irritations are gone, it will wallow, like some pig in the mire, so wretchedly and wildly in all the wealth of the world, and the filth of the flesh, that the whole of its life will be animal and physical rather than human and spiritual.
My spiritual friend, to such degradation as you see here have we fallen through sin. Can we be surprised then that we are totally and easily deceived when we seek to understand the meaning of spiritual words and actions, especially if we do not yet know the faculties of our soul and the way they work?
The Cloud of Unknowing is a late fourteenth-century mystical, contemplative work of Christian devotion. Though unknown, the author was probably a Dominican monk.
Essays
These poor Africans were people of a strange language and not easy to converse with, and their situation as slaves too generally destroyed that brotherly freedom which frequently subsists between us and inoffensive strangers. In this adverse condition, how reasonable is it to suppose that they would revolve in their distressed minds the iniquities committed against them and mourn!—mourn without any to comfort them?
Though through gradual proceedings in unrighteousness dimness has come over many minds, yet the nature of things are not altered. Long oppression has not made oppression consistent with brotherly love, nor length of time through several ages made recompense to the posterity of those injured strangers. Many of them lived and died without having their suffering case heard, and determined according to equity; and under a degree of sorrow on account of the wantonness, the vanity, and superfluity too common among us as a civil society, even while a heavy load of unrighteous proceedings lies upon us, do I now under a feeling of universal love and in a fervent concern for the real interest of my fellow members in society, as well as the interest of my fellow creatures in general, express these things.
Suppose an inoffensive youth, forty years ago, was violently taken from Guinea, sold here as a slave, labored hard till old age, and had children who are now living. Though no sum may properly be mentioned as an equal reward for the total deprivation of liberty, yet if the sufferings of this man be computed at no more than fifty pounds, I expect candid men will suppose it within bounds, and that his children have an equitable right to it.
Now when our minds are thoroughly divested of all prejudice in relation to the difference of color, and the love of Christ in which there is no partiality prevails upon us, I believe it will appear that a heavy account lies against us as a civil society for oppressions committed against people who did not injure us, and that if the particular case of many individuals were fairly stated, it would appear that there was considerable due to them.
I conclude with the words of that righteous judge in Israel: “Behold here I am; witness against me before the Lord and before his anointed: whose ox have I taken? or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind my eyes therewith? and I will restore it to you” (1 Samuel 12:3).
John Woolman (1720–1772)—American Quaker preacher and reformer, Woolman traveled throughout the American colonies and England preaching and promoting the abolition of slavery. He is best known for his Journal, which was published after his death.
Dialogues
Do but think on the Words of our Lord Jesus Christ, when He said, “Except you be converted, and become as little Children, you shall not enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.” There is no shorter Way than this; neither can there be a better Way found. Truly, Jesus says unto you, Unless you turn and become as a Child, hanging upon Him for All Things, you shall not see the Kingdom of God. This do, and Nothing shall hurt you; for you shall be at Friendship with all the Things that are, as you depend on the Author and Fountain of them, and become like Him, by such Dependence, and by the Union of your Will with His Will. But mark what I have further to say; and be not startled at it, though it may seem hard for you at first to conceive. If you will be like All Things, you must forsake All Things; you must turn your Desire away from them All, and not desire or hanker after any of them; you must not extend your Will to possess that for your own, or as your own, which is Something, whatever that Something is.
For as soon as ever you take Something into your Desire, and receive it into yourself for your OWN, or in Propriety, then this very Something (of whatever Nature it is) is the same with yourself; and this works with you in your Will, and you are then bound to protect it, and to take Care of it even as of your own Being. But if you do receive no Thing into your Desire, then you are free from All Things, and rule over all Things at once, as a Prince of God. For you have received Nothing for your own, and are Nothing to all Things; and all Things are as Nothing to you. You are as a Child, which understands not what a Thing is, and though you do perhaps understand it, yet you understand it without mixing with it, and without it sensibly affecting or touching your Perception, even in that Manner where God does rule and see all Things; He comprehending All, and yet Nothing comprehending Him.
Jakob Boehme (1575–1624)—A German Lutheran and mystic, Boehme was not formally educated and worked all of his life as a shoemaker. He read widely and wrote and published with considerable influence among the Pietists, Romantics, Idealists, and Cambridge Platonists.
The Consolation of Philosophy
The more varied your precious possessions, the more help you need to protect them, and the old saying is proved correct, he who has much, wants much. And the contrary is true as well, he needs least who measures wealth according to the needs of nature, and not the excesses of ostentation.
When a being endowed with a godlike quality in virtue of his rational nature thinks that his only splendor lies in the possession of inanimate goods, it is the overthrow of the natural order. Other creatures are content with what is their own, but you, whose mind is made in the image of God, seek to adorn your superior nature with inferior objects, oblivious of the great wrong you do your Creator. It was His will that the human race should rule all earthly creatures, but you have degraded yourself to a position beneath the lowest of all. If every good is agreed to be more valuable than whatever it belongs to, then by your own judgement when you account the most worthless of objects as goods of yours, you make yourself lower than those very things, and it is no less than you deserve. Indeed, the condition of human nature is just this; man towers above the rest of creation so long as he recognizes his own nature, and when he forgets it, he sinks lower than the beasts. For other living things to be ignorant of themselves, is natural; but for man it is a defect.
Anicius Boethius (ca. 480–524)—Philosopher, statesman, and Christian, Boethius was an advisor to the Ostrogothic king Theodoric after the sack of Rome. His Consolation of Philosophy was second only to the Bible as an influence on medieval thought and literature.
Selected Works
Those that dwell in temporal plenty are beguiled by five things that they love: by riches, by dignity, by will, by power, and by worship. These bind them in sin and constrain them in faults; they are overcome by these lusts and never released but by death—but their release is too late, when there is nothing more but endless pain.
These things hinder them from despising the world, from the love of God, from knowledge of themselves and from the desire of the heavenly kingdom. No man may be saved unless he cease to love the world.
Let it be enough for you, therefore, having despised all other things, to love God, to praise God, to be with God, to rejoice in God, not to part from Him but to draw unto Him with unquenched desire. Compel yourself to despise the world that is so full of wretchedness, in which is abiding malice, destroying persecution, swelling wrath and devouring lust, false blame for sins, bitterness of slander; where all things are confused without order, where neither righteousness is loved nor truth approved, where faithfulness is unfaithful and friendship cruel, that stands in prosperity and falls in adversity.
There are yet other things that should move us to the despising of the world: the changing of the times, shortness of this present life, certain death, the uncertain chance of death, stability of everlasting things and vanity of present things, truth of the joys to come. Choose which you will: if you love the world, you shall perish with it; if you love Christ, with him shall you reign.
Richard Rolle of Hampole (ca. 1295–1349)—Rolle was born in Yorkshire and educated at Oxford, but he lived as a hermit and contemplative. He broke with the scholars of his day and wrote in the vernacular to reach those not formally trained in the gospel.