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We are all very thankful—and you are no doubt more so—to see that at last there is some prospect of an end to this ghastly Korean war. Our only fear now is that it may be replaced by a Persian one; but it will be time enough to cross that river when we come to it.
With many thanks and all good wishes,
yours sincerely,
C. S. Lewis
TO MRS D. JESSUP (W): TS
RER328/51.
Magdalen College,
Oxford.
27th July 1951.
Dear Mrs. Jessup,
Thank you for your letter of the 21st. Someone (and someone I don’t even know) had been selected by Charles Williams as his biographer some time before his death, and is in possession of all the materials. So that is that! But don’t imagine you are losing anything. Biography is not in my line.
I agree most strongly with all you say about him, and wish someone really good could do him: but I would’nt, even if there were not another claimant in possession.
With all best wishes,
yours sincerely,
WH Lewis
Secretary.
(Dictated by Mr. Lewis)
TO THE EDITOR OF THE CHURCH TIMES (EC):
(#ulink_20299007-2835-5617-af73-c8e24d8a290b)
Magdalen College,
Oxford.
Sir,—
Having read Mr. Bradbury’s letter on the Holy Name,
(#ulink_0d5ccb7f-76f0-516a-97dd-0af52e794dff) I have a few comments to make. I do not think we are entitled to assume that all who use this Name without reverential prefixes are making a ‘careless’ use of it; otherwise, we should have to say that the evangelists were often careless. I do not think we are entitled to assume that the use of the word Blessed when we speak of the Virgin Mary is ‘necessary’; otherwise, we should have to condemn both the Nicene and the Apostles’ Creed for omitting it.
Should we not rather recognise that the presence or absence of such prefixes constitute a difference, not in faith or morals, but simply in style? I know that their absence is irritating to others. Is not each party innocent in its temperamental preference but grossly culpable if it allows anything so subjective, contingent, and (with a little effort) conquerable as a temperamental preference to become a cause of division among brethren? If we cannot lay down our tastes, along with other carnal baggage, at the church door, surely we should at least bring them in to be humbled and, if necessary, modified, not to be indulged?
C. S. Lewis
TO I. O. EVANS (W):
(#ulink_084ebc7e-c054-506b-8310-e5a938935f5c)
As from Magdalen College,
Oxford
4/8/51
Dear Evans
The Coming of a King
(#ulink_b2f9fea5-f8b3-5814-b57c-452ab0ec278c) arrived most opportunely when I was in almost solitary confinement recovering from mumps, and I read it at two sittings. I think it not only the best but incomparably the best book you have done. The others interested me but this really set wires jangling. I congratulate you. And I think it is a great thing to put that idea of the Stone Age—which is at least as likely to be the true one—into boys’ heads instead of Well’s or Naomi Mitchison’s. It’s all good. The marriage customs are amusing, the Ogres exciting, and the Dark Faces with their quest just add the something more. I hope it will be a great success.
Yours
C. S. Lewis
TO MRS C. VULLIAMY (W):
(#ulink_6081dfd3-032e-5495-a1dd-5b985a7b38fc) TS
RER347/51.
Magdalen College,
Oxford.
10th August 1951.
Dear Mrs. Vulliamy,
Many thanks for your most kind and encouraging letter of the 4th. With all best wishes,
yours sincerely,
C. S. Lewis
TO GEORGE SAYER(W):
Magdalen College
Oxford
15/8/51
You are treasures. Yes, I’d love to. The 15th Sept. week end (i.e. arrive 14th) if I may. Lovely.
I’ve just been having Mumps. Humphrey
(#ulink_a49aebfc-5e23-5bb7-b550-22e098d0e478) kept on quoting me bits out of The Problem of Pain, which I call a bit thick. Love and deep thanks to both.
J
TO GENIA GOELZ (P):
Magdalen College,
Oxford.
September 12, 1951
Dear Mrs Goelz
There is no doubt that laymen, and women, can baptise. The validity would, I suppose, depend on whether you regard the church into which the child is baptised as a part of the true church. I am very impressed that an Episcopalian will not accept Presbyterian baptism (and at the rudeness of his method) but I dare say he knows the rule. I fear I don’t. If I were you I would ask another (quieter and more amiable) Episcopalian parson. Personal animosities or friendships ought to have nothing to do with the question. In great haste.
Yours sincerely
C. S. Lewis
TO MARY VAN DEUSEN (W):
Magdalen etc
Sept 12/1951
Dear Mrs. Van Deusen
It is v. remarkable (or wd. be if we did not know that God arranges things) that you shd. write about our vicarious sufferings when another correspondent has recently written on the same matter.
I have not a word to say against the doctrine that Our Lord suffers in all the sufferings of His people (see Acts IX.6)
(#ulink_913934dd-a1c5-5279-8648-07593818cffd) or that when we willingly accept what we suffer for others and offer it to God on their behalf, then it may be united with His sufferings and, in Him, may help to their redemption or even that of others whom we do not dream of. So that it is not in vain: tho’ of course we must not count on seeing it work out exactly as we, in our present ignorance, might think best. The key text for this view is Colossians I.24.
(#ulink_43fa6219-e952-57ca-8105-ce9dd5aec10e) Is it not, after all, one more application of the truth that we are all ‘members of one another’?
(#ulink_300db842-0c3d-5a60-a8fa-235a93da8111) I wish I had known more when I wrote the Problem of Pain.
God bless you all. Be sure that Grace flows into you and out of you and through you in all sorts of ways, and no faithful submission to pain in yourself or in another will be wasted.
Yours ever
C. S. Lewis
TO MRS D. JESSUP (W):
Magdalen College,
Oxford.
Sept 12/51
Dear Mrs. Jessup
Yes, I shd. jolly well think I have met that problem of the division between loving hearts when one comes to believe and have known something of it in my own life.
(#ulink_4aaf94fe-3755-55b6-8c9d-4920b4816f4b) The poem on Galahad at Caerleon
(#ulink_174c4f55-14d6-57bc-a01d-8f6758f09d30) touches it, doesn’t it? Our Lord foresaw it: see Luke XII 49-53.
(#ulink_a9448f26-77db-50dd-87f2-caf6fa039cd6)
I have not the ghost of anything that cd. be called a ‘solution’. Perhaps this pain cannot be avoided: is it not the tension between the Church and the World breaking out in each household. Sometimes the unconverted party, hitherto quite kind, becomes almost diabolical:
(#ulink_83ed8eea-bfa4-5a0e-9106-07cd4c98d36c) but the other often wins him (or her) over in the end. (I don’t think you are conceited at all!)
Yours sincerely
C. S. Lewis
TO DON GIOVANNI CALABRIA (V):
Magdalen College,
Oxford,
England
Sept. 13th 1951
Dilectissime Pater—
Insolito gaudio affectus sum tuâ espistolâ et eo magis quod audivi te aegritudine laborare; interdum timui ne forte mortem obisses. Minime tamen cessavi ab orationibus pro te: ñeque enim debet illud Flumen Mortis duke commercium caritatis et cogitationum abolere. Nunc gaudeo quia credo (quamquam taces de valetudine–noli contemnere corpus, Fratrem Asinum, ut dixit Sanctus Franciscus!) tibi iam bene aut saltern melius esse. Mitto ad te fabulam meam nuper Italice versam; in qua sane magis lusi quam laboravi. Fantasiae meae liberas remisi habenas haud tamen (spero) sine respectu ad aedificationem et meam et proximi. Nescio utrum hujusmodi nugis dilecteris; at si non tu, fortasse quidam juvenis aut puella ex bonis tuis líberís amabit. Equidem post longam successionem modicorum morborum (quorum nomina Itálica nescio) iam valeo. Quinquagesimum diem natalem sacerdotii tui gratu-lationibus, precibus, benedictionibus saluto. Vale. Oremus pro invicem semper in hoc mundo et in futuro.
C. S. Lewis
*
Magdalen College,
Oxford,
England
Sept 13th 1951
