The Lewis Legacy-Issue 76, Spring 1998 Notes and Quotes

“Much is made of Jack’s ‘Anglicanism’, indeed far more is made of it by others than was ever made of it by Jack. Jack was more and more a Mere Christian, and towards the end of his life was less Churchian than anyone I know. I think it is inevitable that as one grows closer to Christ (as Jack did) that one grows further away from the things of men, and that includes churches. (Incidentally, Jack did not regularly attend RC masses towards the end of his life, that story is a lie.) Jack was an Anglican as a matter of habit and a sense of family duty. I suppose that he found less objectionable in that church than in the others, but his commitment was first to Jesus, then to His people, the poor and lowly (in all senses), and eventually somewhere fairly well down the line, to the Anglican church.”

Douglas Gresham, MERELEWIS, April 1998

“Most examples of Symbolist art and literature [1860-1910] evoke no emotional responses in an ordinary person of the present day other than boredom, perplexity, or a vague sensation of concealed evil…. Some ‘decadent’ art and literature is explicit, but most engenders merely a vague unease, because it employs systems of private symbolism. These apparently derive their inspiration from private allusions employed by sexual deviants at all periods of history. Such concealment is not primarily intended as a protective device. On the contrary, its main aim is to heighten the perverted pleasures of those initiated into the meaning of the symbols.”

Winter 1997 Issue of Orts, Newsletter of the George MacDonald Society

“The conscience darkened by its own shame or someone else’s will indeed find your words harsh. Nevertheless, avoid all falsehood and reveal all you have seen; let them scratch where they are scabby. Even if your words offend people’s taste buds at first, when they are digested they will become vital nutrition.”

Dante, Canto 17 of Paradise