Till We Have Faces: A Great Fall or Halloween Read

by C.S. Lewis

‘You don’t understand. Not that kind of longing. It was when I was happiest that I longed most.

And because it was so beautiful, it set me longing, always longing. Somewhere else there must be more of it.

Who can feel ugly when the heart meets delight?

‘Don’t you think the things people are most ashamed of are the things they can’t help?’

Sometimes I wondered who or what sends us this senseless repetition of days and nights and seasons and years; is it not like hearing a stupid boy whistle the same tune over and over, till you wonder how he can bear it himself?

The complaint was the answer. To have heard myself making it was to be answered.

Till that word can be dug out of us, why should they hear the babble that we think we mean? How can they meet us face to face till we have faces?

know now, Lord, why you utter no answer. You are yourself the answer. Before your face questions die away.