One is the class which makes formulas
and shallow little ideals its gods and has no glimpse of human needs and
the plain issues of life. The other is the egotist whose eye is always
filled with his own figure, who investigates his motives, and hesitates
and finicks, till Death knocks him on the head and there is an end of
him. Of the two give me the second, for even a narrow little
egotistical self is better than a formula. But I pray to be delivered
from both."
"'Then who shall stand if Thou, O Lord, dost mark iniquity?'" Lewis
quoted.
"There are two men only who will not be ashamed to look their work in
the face in the end--the brazen opportunist and the rigid Puritan.
Suppose you had some desperate frontier work to get through with and a
body of men to pick for it, whom would you take? Not the ordinary,
colourless, respectable being, and still less academic nonentities! If
I had my pick, my companions should either be the narrowest religionists
or frank, unashamed blackguards. I should go to the Calvinists and the
fanatics for choice, but if I could not get them then I should have the
rankers. For, don't you see, the first would have the fear of God in
them, and that somehow keeps a man from fearing anything else. They
would do their work because they believed it to be their duty. And the
second would have the love of the sport in them, and they should also be
made to dwell in the fear of me.
Pages:
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204