Explore Quotes by C. S. Lewis

There is a kind of happiness and wonder that makes you serious. It is too good to waste on jokes.

He who has not forgiven an enemy has never yet tasted one of the most sublime enjoyments of life.

Solemnity is proper in church, but things that are proper in church are not necessarily proper outside, and vice versa. For example, I can say a prayer while washing my teeth, but that does not mean I should wash my teeth in church.

Nothing is more dangerous to one's own faith than the work of an apologist. No doctrine of that faith seems to me so spectral, so unreal as one that I have just successfully defended in a public debate.

Always prefer the plain direct word to the long, vague one. Don't implement promises, but keep them.

Some people write heavily, some write lightly. I prefer the light approach because I believe there is a great deal of false reverence about. There is too much solemnity and intensity in dealing with sacred matters; too much speaking in holy tones.

'Good English' is whatever educated people talk; so that what is good in one place or time would not be so in another.

Always try to use the language so as to make quite clear what you mean and make sure your sentence couldn't mean anything else.

Real joy seems to me almost as unlike security or prosperity as it is unlike agony.

Anthropomorphic animals, when taken out of narrative into actual visibility, always turn into buffoonery or nightmare.

There is no uncreated being except God. God has no opposite.

'The Lion' all began with a picture of a faun carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood. This picture had been in my mind since I was about sixteen. Then one day, when I was about forty, I said to myself, 'Let's try to make a story about it.'

History isn't just the story of bad people doing bad things. It's quite as much a story of people trying to do good things. But somehow, something goes wrong.

I think that all things, in their way, reflect heavenly truth, the imagination not least.

Everyone has noticed how hard it is to turn our thoughts to God when everything is going well with us... While what we call 'our own life' remains agreeable, we will not surrender it to Him. What, then, can God do in our interests but make 'our own life' less agreeable to us, and take away the plausible sources of false happiness?

We must show our Christian colors if we are to be true to Jesus Christ.

What I call my 'self' now is hardly a person at all. It's mainly a meeting place for various natural forces, desires, and fears, etcetera, some of which come from my ancestors, and some from my education, some perhaps from devils. The self you were really intended to be is something that lives not from nature but from God.

Writing is like a 'lust,' or like 'scratching when you itch.' Writing comes as a result of a very strong impulse, and when it does come, I, for one, must get it out.

I'm tall, fat, rather bald, red-faced, double-chinned, black-haired, have a deep voice, and wear glasses for reading.

Satan, the leader or dictator of devils, is the opposite, not of God, but of Michael.

Failures, repeated failures, are finger posts on the road to achievement. One fails forward toward success.