bits and bants vol. 2
she's been reading CS Lewis again...
Hello all! Hope you’ve had a fine week, mine got rolling and soon felt a bit out of control. But is that how all weeks go?
I’ve had a reread of The Abolition of Man this week. It’s been a number of years since I’ve read it, definitely pre-pandemic, and it hits even harder after these pandemic years.
I think one of the most important connections Lewis makes in the book is the connection between the meaning of language to the supposition of values. If you change what words mean, you change the narrative of meaning in so many ways. Quickly and unknowingly people have surrendered values because meanings of words have changed. But they didn’t even know their values were built upon specific meaning in the first place! In consequence, objective principles become eroded to fit the subjective values of the fad or moment in time.
Of course Lewis is making this argument towards the importance of real education, or orienting minds towards the Truth. As evidenced in the past few years, however, is what happens when an entire society is not really educated is that culture, and really, the fabric of society can be torn with surprising speed.
I’m left wondering what we do not even with an uneducated society that does not understand the necessity of being aligned with objective truth and reality, but with a society that does not even desire truth and reality.
The importance of education as the proper ordering of virtues and what is good, can only come after the cultivation of the desire for the true, good, and beautiful. I know I shouldn’t doubt the transcendentals, but in a world that seems to offer so many cheap replicas to them with numberless distractions, it seems the greatest temptation is to simply never even notice the desire.
Add it all to the long list of things I worry I won’t be able to give my children!
Bits to Read
Ted Goia’s interesting article on Sigrid Undset is lovely. I also found his Barnes and Noble piece fascinating, and so true as I was in an abominable Indigo store yesterday and found it painful.
I love rare and used books, and find the AbeBooks Most Expensive Sales of 2022 list surprising!
Reading, Watching, What Have You
We watched The Banshees of Inisherin this week and I loved it. It’s a bizarre story of friendship, the effects our actions have on others, and the consequences of not choosing forgiveness, but filmed beautifully, written perfectly, and acted wonderfully. I also have a soft spot in my heart for miniature donkeys.
If my duty to my parents is a superstition, then so is my duty to posterity. If the pursuit of justice is a superstition, then so is my duty to my country or my race. If the pursuit of scientific knowledge is a real value, then so is conjugal fidelity. … The human mind has no more power of inventing a new value than of imagining a new primary colour; or, indeed, of creating a new sun and a new sky for it to move in. - CS Lewis, The Abolition of Man
Happy weekend, hope it involves watching football and seeing Tom Brady lose.
-Christy
Now I am mad I didn’t go into a Barnes and noble on my trip!