The Medieval Mind of C. S. Lewis: How Great Books Shaped a Great Mind

by Jason M. Baxter

In other words, the “disenchantment” of the cosmos was accompanied by a psychological effect, one that, as we have seen, Lewis was attentive to his whole life: the modern tendency to possess a cranky irritability about our own private, inner space. Lewis thought that in modernity human beings have a particular tendency to think of what is inside them—thoughts, dreams, feelings, emotions, desires—as a kind of inner sanctum, which they might sometimes share but is where they feel most real and authentic. Lewis thought this tendency to psychological individualism was not only peculiarly modern but presented a special obstacle to loving God, given that we are constitutionally reluctant to admit God into the inner chamber of our life, even when we are committed to living externally in a moral way. We draw a line, and want to keep our own as our own. In a fascinating essay, “A Slip of the Tongue,” Lewis sums up this reluctance to deep conversion: I say my prayers, I read a book of devotion, I prepare for, or receive, the Sacrament. But while I do these things, there is, so to speak, a voice inside me that urges caution. It tells me to be careful, to keep my head, not to go too far, not to burn my boats. I come into the presence of God with a great fear, lest anything should happen to me within that presence which will prove too intolerably inconvenient when I have to come out again into my “ordinary” life. I don’t want to be carried away into any resolution which I shall afterwa...