"It is a serious thing to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree helping each other to one or the other of these destinations.
It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics.
There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendors."
- C.S. Lewis
It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics.
There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations - these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendors."
- C.S. Lewis
Found at Whiskey River this morning on my rambles through the Blogosphere. Ponderous thought.
16 comments:
Good to see you again Martha. That is a dizzying thought isn't it.
In some ways, quite a wake up call, in the sense that we help each other towards expansion or contraction of our natures - in another, typical C.s. Lewis in that it's an either/or proposition, most of us continue to be angel/demon combos our whole lives.
I've missed you Sophie!
Yes this is a ponderous one.
That C.S. Lewis so often rubs my fur the wrong way, in part because he so often says something I *halfway* like!
(Like Sparker, maybe? I find him too heavy handed and judgmental.)
Still, this quote of his reminds me of a similar teaching:
"Always assume good intentions."
This rubs my fur wrong too, sometimes, as my ego thrums with self-satisfaction when it gets to feel wronged...
And of course, the assumption is not always correct. Still, in general I feel it's a good default position to start from.
C.S. Lewis has always struck me as a bit of a fearmonger. His prose confuses me more often than not, I must admit.
We are all of us frighteningly, astoundingly, excitingly but always interestingly special...
I like C.S. Lewis and that sense of sacredness/spirituality in all things. Sort of an Pandora world.
When I worked at the Detroit main library, I would often cross the street to eat lunch beside a copy of The Thinker. He was very good company.
I've never come across this C.S. Lewis passage, thank you for sharing it.
But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit -
This part especially rings true with me. People may be dismissive of day to day actions and day to day words. But all of these things have consequences, all of these things shape others and they shape you (a small act of kindness can turn someone's day around, or perhaps allow them to see something in a new light; an insult can fester in someone's mind and this hurt can spill out on other people) We affect each other in millions of ways - it's not wise to be careless, though we're also human and slips are inevitable.
I think part of what I like about this passage is that it takes the sublime and the horrible and shows us that they're not just a part of large, grand events, but they exist all the time, not only in obvious or extreme forms.
I am humbled.
A ponderous thought, ponderously expressed. I haven't read any C. S. Lewis for ages and I'm surprised he is so frequently banal, imprecise and redundant. I think he profits from being represented by Anthony Hopkins in "Shadowlands". A memory of him on b/w TV crops up: the interviewer asks what the first man to reach the surface of the moon "will do"? Rather irritably Lewis says, "Well, he'll die of course." So he wasn't much of a prophet either.
He is not the first person to emphasise the desirability of treating others as unique. But his suggestion implies self-abnegation. There is no allowance for the fact that the person making the approach is entitled to feel that he/she too is unique. There is an overlap here with his Christianity; if the person approached turns out to be cantankerous, withdrawn or just plain evil the approacher is, I assume, required to turn the other cheek. To persist. Yet how sympathetic am I likely to be towards his/her uniqueness if I discover that that person is just back from heaving a brick through the window of a Democrat congressman who voted in support of Healthcare? OK, I'm loading the dice. But may I be permitted to loathe where I feel loathing is permitted.
I'm sorry if this is strong meat and you are still a little frail. But I caught a suggestion in your post (maybe it was just ambiguity) that you weren't all that enchanted anyway. If I'm wrong, humble apologies. Blame the fact that I am diminished by having to lay down my fish's tail.
I don't think he has ever met that secretary in my building on the second floor who chomps her gum so loudly that I can hear it on the fourth floor. The one who talks to her boyfriend IN A CROWDED ELEVATOR on her cell phone and says things like, "Oh, baby...I could hardly leave you this morning, so I just planted a kiss on your hairy ole butt...."
Yeah...she is fascinating.
I have always thought it a mistake to regard anyone as a dull. Better to seek to be surprised.
"...immortal horrors or everlasting splendors."
As ArtSparker notes, ultimately we're both. This has always been my biggest stumbling block with Buddhism, the concept that we are all one. Being one with someone like the Dalai Lama or Carl Sagan is an uplifting idea. The idea of being one with the gum-chewing secretary who lets the world know that she literally kisses hairy butts is repellent, which says as much about me as it does about her.
It reminds me of a Henry Miller quote that I try to bear in mind as much as possible: "What seems nasty, painful, evil, can become a source of beauty, joy and strength, if faced with an open mind. ."
Thanks, Martha & C.S., for re-opening my mind for at least a little while.
"There are no ordinary people."
How often we forget.
Yes, the Buddha taught that we must treat all creatures as though they were our mother in a previous life. It's a very tall order and I'll admit I didn't always get along with my mother in this life. Still, deep down we always loved no matter the mutual annoyances.
Sorry - I inadvertantly posted this comment on your previous post.
As a latecomer to this debate I am prompted to add my observations.
Without being a doctor of English language I reckon the part of the first sentence beginning with “…or else a corruption” is ungrammatical or if not, badly written and difficult to interpret. This must prompt one to question the author’s ability to express his meaning.
I suggest that in the second sentence it is only that we MAY be “…helping each other” rather than “are”.
In the second paragraph I do not see why we should be “…in awe”. My feelings on the piece are: I believe that we should withold judgement on new acquaintances for some time, rather than forming unbalanced first opinions, and that this is a matter of common sense which increases with age.
The last paragraph says that we are all unique which is an unavoidable, and unnecessarily stated fact – there is nothing glamorous, splendiferous or sentimental about this.
Following BB hinting at your possible doubts I suppose this comes from your “…Ponderous thought” comment.
Post a Comment