Collected Letters Volume Three: Narnia, Cambridge and Joy 1950–1963

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

11th October 1952.

Dear Mrs. Gebbert,

But hang it all, if you come on the 18th and 19th I shall see so little of you—being engaged to dine out on Saturday; and I can’t put it off because it is with people I’ve had to refuse on several other occasions. Would you think us Pigs if we adhered to the original date? Not if it means you’ll have to sleep on the Embankment of course!

Yours sincerely,

C. S. Lewis

TO HERBERT PALMER (TEX):

Coll. Magd.

16/10/52

My dear Palmer

I wrote a letter to Miss Hesketh222 (I mean, a real one, not the mere acknowledgement) about the book223 some weeks ago. As Heinemann is one of those accursed firms that don’t put their address on the title page I sent it c/o their old address and it came back as a dead letter. I then sent it c/o my own publisher. Has Miss Hesketh not had it yet?

I liked many of the poems v. much, especially the phrasing. Do let me know if the letter has ever arrived. As for helping the book, what can one do against the massive rampart of false taste in our times? That is the ‘railway line’: you and Miss Hesketh are the real unmacadamised road or immemorial Right of Way across the field. But they are stopping the Right of Way. How are you these days? It was nice to hear from you again.

Yours

C. S. Lewis

TO JOHN ROWLAND (TEX):224 PC

Magdalen College

Oxford

16/10/52

Good. My Mon. evgs. are, unhappily, always filled up by the Socratic Club. The safest thing (for an unspecified week) is Lunch on Monday and as much talk as you can spare me afterwards. If you can fix which Monday I will book it. I much look forward to meeting.

C. S. Lewis

TO ARTHUR GREEVES (BOD):

Magdalen College

Oxford

17/10/52

My dear Arthur

I’ve finished vol. I of the Letters of HJ. I announce this not to hurry you but to show that I have enjoyed yr. gift. I’m afraid he was a dreadful Prig, but he is by no means a bore and has lots of interesting things to say about books. Was it you sent me the Northern ‘Whig’?225 If so thanks.

Yours

Jack

TO VERA GEBBERT (W): TS 52/103.

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

18th October 1952.

Dear Mrs. Gebbert,

What a misfortune for you, and what a disappointment for us! ‘Flu is a horrid thing at the best of times, but to contract it when on holiday, and in a strange city, is to have it under the most wretched conditions.

We hope that this does not mean a final cancellation of your visit: but I am making no alternative suggestion until I see what is in the letter you are writing me.

With deepest sympathy to you both and best wishes for a short illness and speedy recovery,

Yours,

C. S. Lewis

TO MARY VAN DEUSEN (W):

Magdalen etc.

Oct 20th 1952

Dear Mrs. Van Deusen

I think you are perfectly right to change your manner of prayer from time to time and I shd. suppose that all who pray seriously do thus change it. One’s needs and capacities change and also, for creatures like us, excellent prayers may ‘go dead’ if we use them too long. Whether one shd. use written prayers composed by other people, or one’s own words or own wordless prayer, or in what proportion one shd. mix all three, seems to me entirely a question for each individual to answer from his own experience.

I myself find prayers without words the best, when I can manage it, but I can do so only when least distracted and in best spiritual and bodily health (or what I think best). But another person might find it quite otherwise.

Your question about old friendships where there is no longer spiritual communion is a hard one. Obviously it depends v. much on what the other party wants. The great thing in friendship as in all other forms of love is, as you know, to turn from the demand to be loved (or helped or answered) to the wish to love (or help or answer). Perhaps in so far as one does this one also discovers how much love one shd. spend on the sort of friends you mention. I don’t think a decay in one’s desire for mere ‘society’ or ‘acquaintance’ or ‘the crowd’ is a bad sign. (We mustn’t take it as a sign of one’s increasing spirituality of course: isn’t it merely a natural, neutral, development as one grows older?).

All that Calvinist question—Free-Will & Predestination, is to my mind undiscussable, insoluble. Of course (say us) if a man repents God will accept him. Ah yes, (say they) but the fact of his repenting shows that God has already moved him to do so. This at any rate leaves us with the fact that in any concrete case the question never arrives as a practical one. But I suspect it is really a meaningless question. The difference between Freedom & Necessity is fairly clear on the bodily level: we know the difference between making our teeth chatter on purpose & just finding them chattering with cold. It begins to be less clear when we talk of human love (leaving out the erotic kind). ‘Do I like him because I choose or because I must?’–there are cases where this has an answer, but others where it seems to me to mean nothing. When we carry it up to relations between God & Man, has the distinction perhaps become nonsensical? After all, when we are most free, it is only with a freedom God has given us: and when our will is most influenced by Grace, it is still our will. And if what our will does is not ‘voluntary’, and if ‘voluntary’ does not mean ‘free’, what are we talking about? I’d leave it all alone. Blessings.

Yours

C. S. Lewis

TO VERA GEBBERT (W):

Magdalen etc.

Oct 20th 1952

Poor dear Gebberts

I am sorry. Whatever may be said for foreign travel, it is horrid when one is ill: the wounded animal wants to creep away to its own den. But the total situation, you must now learn, is quite other than you supposed when you wrote on Saturday evening. That same evening our housekeeper (the only stay of our house and the nearest thing you wd. have had to a hostess) also went down with flu’. So if she had gone down 24 hours earlier we shd. have been wiring to put you off: and if you’d gone down 24 hours later our house wd. now be an amateur Nursing Home staffed by two elderly and incompetent bachelors–themselves liable at any moment to become two more patients. So all has not, perhaps, been quite so much for the worst as you supposed.

At any rate you have nothing to apologise for except what we should have had to apologise for if you hadn’t. (Don’t try to work this sentence out until your temperature is now normal). We had hoped that, tho’ we can’t now offer hospitality, you might have got down here for lunch some day, but I quite see how you can’t. Don’t feel in the least bad about the contre-temps: if you, and our Miss Henry, were to have flu’ the times couldn’t have fitted in better!226 And you keep that whiskey and drink it all yourselves: you’ll need it—and you won’t get any fit to drink over here. Thanks—blessings–sympathies—and all good wishes for a speedy recovery.

Yours,

W. H. Lewis

C. S. Lewis

TO ROGER LANCELYN GREEN (BOD):

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

21/10/52

My dear Roger

Your letter was more than usually welcome: for tho’ reason assured me that so busy a man might have 100 motives for not writing, I had also a lurking fear that you might be offended. Forgive me the suspicion. It arose not at all because I judge you to be that kind of ass, or any kind, but because, we being ‘of one blood’, the loss of you wd. be a very raw gash in my life.

I had a letter from G. Greene’s secretary to say that he was abroad but wd. be shown my letter as soon as he returned. I fear that will make it too late for him to act on it even if he has justice enough to wish to. I have just finished Vol. I of Henry James’s letters. An interesting man, tho’ a dreadful prig: but he did appreciate Stevenson. A phantasmal man, who had never known God, or earth, or war, never done a day’s compelled work, never had to earn a living, had no home & no duties.

My brother is reading A.E.W.M.227 with great enjoyment. You seem to be getting a pretty good Press: congratulations.

Love to lune. I look forward to seeing you next month.

Yours

Jack

TO VERA GEBBERT (W): TS 52/103.

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

21st October 1952.

My dear Mr. and Mrs. Gebbert,

I am sure you will not misunderstand me when I say that the opening of your wonderful parcel this morning was a melancholy rather than joyful ceremony; we had both looked forward so much to its happening under very different circumstances—your presentation, our (for the first time verbal) thanks, the popping of a cork in front of the log fire in our sitting room—well, well, ‘man never is, but always to be blessed’. Once more it is a case of ‘thank you very, very much’ on the typewriter, instead of in person. By the way, it was very naughty of you to send the whisky, unless, as I hope, you had some more with you: for there is no better tonic after ‘flu–experto crede.228

We both hope that the second part of your holiday will be less unfortunate than its beginning, and that by this time you are really over your troubles; if you find time to send a post card letting us know how you fare, it would be very welcome. In any case I feel that climatically Munich must be a change for the better, and no doubt also financially.

Our Vera, Vera Henry does’nt look like escaping as well as you have done; she was removed to a nursing home yesterday, and the doctor talks in the roundabout way that doctors do, about a possible risk of pneumonia. But we shan’t know anything definite for a day or two.

While you are leaving a trail of golden dollars across Europe is perhaps hardly a tactful moment to talk about another holiday; but we do both hope that meeting you is but a pleasure postponed, and that another year you will venture to England again, and this time penetrate as far as Oxford.

With all best wishes to you both from us both,

yours,

W. H. Lewis

C. S. Lewis*

TO JOHN ROWLAND (TEX): TS

52/213.

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

23rd October 1952.

Dear Rowland,

(Let’s drop the honorifics on both sides). November 3rd. would be best. I’ll wait for you in the College lodge about 1.10.

Yours,

C. S. Lewis

TO THE EDITOR OF THE CHURCH TIMES (EC): 229

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

Sir,–

I am, like Mr Eric Pitt,230 a layman, and would like to be instructed on several points before the proposal to set up a ‘system’ of Anglican canonization is even discussed. According to the Catholic Encyclopaedia, ‘saints’ are dead people whose virtues have made them ‘worthy’ of God’s ‘special’ love.231 Canonization makes dulia232 ‘universal and obligatory’; and, whatever else it asserts, it certainly asserts that the person concerned ‘is in heaven’.

Unless, then, the word ‘canonization’ is being used in a sense distinct from the Roman (and, if so, some other word would be much more convenient), the proposal to set up a ‘system’ of canonization means that someone (say, the Archbishops) shall be appointed

(a.) To tell us that certain named people are (i) ‘in heaven’, and (ii) are ‘worthy’ of God’s ‘special’ love.

(b.) To lay upon us (under pain of excommunication?) the duty of dulia towards those they have named.

Now it is very clear that no one ought to tell us what he does not know to be true. Is it, then, held that God has promised (and, if so, when and where?) to the Church universal a knowledge of the state of certain departed souls? If so, is it clear that this knowledge will discern varying degrees of kinds of salvation such as are, I suppose, implicit in the word ‘special’? And if it does, will the promulgation of such knowledge help to save souls now in viâ?. For it might well lead to a consideration of ‘rival claims’, such as we read of in the Imitation of Christ (Bk. Ill, ch. lvii), where we are warned, ‘Ask not which is greater in the kingdom of heaven…the search into such things brings no profit, but rather offends the saints themselves.’

Finally, there is the practical issue: by which I do not mean the Catholic Encyclopaedia’s neat little account of ‘the ordinary actual expenses of canonization’ (though that too can be read with profit), but the danger of schism. Thousands of members of the Church of England doubt whether dulia is lawful. Does anyone maintain that it is necessary to salvation? If not, whence comes our obligation to run such frightful risks?

C. S. Lewis

TO J. O. REED (P): 233

[Magdalen College

27 October 1952]

Dear Reed

Wd. this interest you?234 Mastership at W. would, I think, be a pretty good springboard for any academic job that turned up, and, I know, a very good springboard for any other schoolmastering job. It is just possible you might increase your academic chances by sticking to research & not flirting with school jobs–I’m not sure. On the other hand, the W. job wd. be a safety device in case no academic job is attained. The President might have good advice to give on the question of policy.235

Yours

C. S. Lewis

TO VERA GEBBERT (W): TS 52/103.

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

28th October 1952.

Dear Gebberts,

Yes indeed, the whole parcel arrived intact, and I’m sorry that I did not make it clear that we had got your beautiful scarves (and the cigarettes) as well as the whiskey; and when the two latter gifts are, alas, nothing but a fragrant memory, we shall still be enjoying the scarves–which can be used with comfort for about nine months in the English year, as you can well imagine, after your disastrous experience. It is very welcome news that you are through your troubles, and are enjoying yourselves in Munich; it must be a great treat for Mr. Gebbert to have such a reunion after so many years. What you have to say about the re-building is very interesting: but I hope there is not going to be a political rebuild. Our papers are carrying an unpleasant story of a get together party of old concentration guards, anti-allied speeches, shouts of ‘Swinehound Eisenhower’ etc.

I’m sorry to say our Vera–may I say our other Vera?–so far from being better, has developed pneumonia, and is now in a nursing home; she is going along satisfactorily, but we are still not without anxiety about her. Largely her own fault, for she has since confessed that she had been feeling ill for at least a week before she took to her bed. Like all people who normally have perfect health, she is not a good patient, which I fear will retard her recovery.

We shall think of you next week on your way back to your own land, with, I hope, happy memories of the trip: and taking with you our hopes that you will repeat it in the not too distant future.

All good luck.

Yours sincerely,

W. H. Lewis

C. S. Lewis

TO PHOEBE HESKETH (W):

Magdalen College,

Oxford

Oct 29th 1952

Dear Mrs. Hesketh

Surely I didn’t say that ‘really good’ poetry was not painful (which wd. make Lear not really good), but that the very best and certainly rarest kind of all was not painful?236

I hope very much you will come and see me when you are in Oxford. I have just given The Quenchless Flame a first reading. I predict it will grow either shorter or longer before it reaches its final form, but it is full of good things. The leaf escaping from the bondage of the tree at the v. beginning wins one’s good will for the whole poem. The six lines beginning ‘Consider beauty’ are particularly good.

Yours sincerely

C. S. Lewis

TO MARG-RIETTE MONTGOMERY (W): TS

REF.52/248.

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

1st November 1952.

Dear Miss Montgomery,

It would be a bit hard to believe in Our Lord without believing in the Father, seeing that Our Lord spent most of his time talking about the Father. Also God.

Yours sincerely,

C. S. Lewis

TO JOHN ROWLAND (TEX): TS

52/213.

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

6th November 1952.

My dear Rowland,

There was no need at all to write, but it was nice of you to do so. I don’t forsee being in Brighton, but will certainly look you up if I am. No addresses to Literary Groups though!

Yours,

C. S. Lewis

TO MRS JOHNSON (W):237

Magdalen etc,

Oxford.

Nov. 8 1952

Dear Mrs. Johnson

I am returning your letter with the questions in it numbered so that you’ll know wh. I am answering.

(1.)238 Some call me Mr. and some Dr. and I not only don’t care but usually don’t know which.

(2.)239 Distinguish (A) A second chance in the strict sense, i.e. a new earthly life in which you cd. attempt afresh all the problems you failed at in the present one (as in religions of Re-Incarnation). (B) Purgatory: a process by which the work of redemption continues, and first perhaps begins to be noticeable after death. I think Charles Williams depicts B, not A.

(3.)240 We are never given any knowledge of ‘What would have happened if…’

(4.)241 I think that every prayer which is sincerely made even to a false god or to a v. imperfectly conceived true God, is accepted by the true God and that Christ saves many who do not think they know Him. For He is (dimly) present in the good side of the inferior teachers they follow.

In the parable of the Sheep & Goats (Matt. XXV. 31 and following) those who are saved do not seem to know that they have served Christ. But of course our anxiety about unbelievers is most usefully employed when it leads us not to speculation but to earnest prayer for them and the attempt to be in our own lives such good advertisements for Christianity as will make it attractive.

(5.)242 It is Christ Himself, not the Bible, who is the true word of God. The Bible, read in the right spirit and with the guidance of good teachers will bring us to Him. When it becomes really necessary (i.e. for our spiritual life, not for controversy or curiosity) to know whether a particular passage is rightly translated or is Myth (but of course Myth specially chosen by God from among countless Myths to carry a spiritual truth) or history, we shall no doubt be guided to the right answer. But we must not use the Bible (our fathers too often did) as a sort of Encyclopedia out of which texts (isolated from their context and not read without attention243 to the whole nature & purport of the books in which they occur) can be taken for use as weapons.

(6.) Kill means murder. I don’t know Hebrew: but when Our Lord quotes this commandment he uses Gk phoneuseis (murder)244 not apokteinein (kill)245

[(7.)]246 The question of what you wd. ‘want’ is off the point. Capital punishment might be wrong tho’ the relations of the murdered man wanted him killed: it might be right tho’ they did not want this. The question is whether a Xtian nation ought or ought not to put murderers to death: not what passions interested individuals may feel.

(8.)247 There is no doubt at all that the natural impulse to ‘hit back’ must be fought against by the Xtian whenever it arises. If one I love is tortured or murdered my desire to avenge him must be given no quarter. So far as nothing but this question of retaliation comes in ‘turn the other cheek’ is the Christian law. It is, however, quite another matter when the neutral, public authority (not the aggrieved person) may order killing of either private murderers or public enemies in mass. It is quite clear that our earliest Christian writer, St Paul, approved of capital punishment—he says the ‘magistrate’ bears & should bear ‘the sword’.248 It is recorded that the soldiers who came to St John Baptist asking, ‘What shall we do?’249 were not told to leave the army. When Our Lord Himself praised the Centurion250 He never hinted that the military profession was in itself sinful. This has been the general view of Christendom. Pacifism is a v. recent & local variation. We must of course respect & tolerate Pacifists, but I think their view erroneous.

(9.)251 The symbols under which Heaven is presented to us are (a) a dinner party,252 (b) a wedding,253 (c) a city,254 and (d) a concert.255 It wd. be grotesque to suppose that the guests or citizens or members of the choir didn’t know one another. And how can love of one another be commanded in this life if it is to be cut short at death?

(10.)256 Whatever the answer is, I’m sure it is not that (‘erased from the brain’). When I have learnt to love God better than my earthly dearest, I shall love my earthly dearest better than I do now. In so far as I learn to love my earthly dearest at the expense of God and instead of God, I shall be moving towards the state in which I shall not love my earthly dearest at all. When first things are put first, second things are not suppressed but increased. If you and I ever come to love God perfectly, the answer to this tormenting question will then become clear, and will be far more beautiful than we cd. ever imagine. We can’t have it now.

(11.)257 Thanks v. much: but I haven’t a sweet tooth.

(12.)258 Not that I know of: but I’m the last person who wd. know.

(13.)259 There is a poor barber whom my brother and I sometimes help. I got up one day intending to go to him for a hair-cut preparatory to going to London. Got a message putting off London engagement and decided to postpone hair-cut. Something, however, kept on nagging me to stick to it–‘Get your hair cut.’ In the end, said ‘Oh damn it, I’ll go.’

All good wishes.

Yours

C. S. Lewis

TO GEOFFREY BLES (BOD): TS 52/42.

Magdalen College,

Oxford.

10th November 1952.

My dear Bles

I return Mr. Dell’s letter.260 I don’t think there’d be any point in republishing Spirits in Bondage. I don’t remember the ‘sermon in the midlands’,261 but it was probably made from notes, and is now irrecoverable. There are, of course, several short pieces in prose and verse (from Spectator, Punch, Time and Tide etc.) which might be used some day.

I’m glad to hear the Dawn Treader goes on well.

Yours

C. S. Lewis

TO MARY WILLIS SHELBURNE (W):

Magdalen College,

Oxford

Nov. 10th 1952

Dear Mrs. Shelburne

It is a little difficult to explain how I feel that tho’ you have taken a way which is not for me262 I nevertheless can congratulate you—I suppose because your faith and joy are so obviously increased. Naturally, I do not draw from that the same conclusions as you—but there is no need for us to start a controversial correspondence!

I believe we are very near to one another, but not because I am at all on the Rome-ward frontier of my own communion. I believe that, in the present divided state of Christendom, those who are at the heart of each division are all closer to one another than those who are at the fringes. I wd. even carry this beyond the borders of Christianity: how much more one has in common with a real Jew or Muslim than with a wretched liberalising, occidentalised specimen of the same categories.