“Subsequent critics have done just that and have constructed a variety of theories to account for the Puritans’ failure to write poetry. Usually in works centered on other subjects, these critics have offered major statements on Puritan poetry. Since so many such statements exist and since even modern critics of Puritan poetry have taken little …
And the Problem is not With the Non-Readers
“And modern poetry is read by very few who are not themselves poets, professional critics, or teachers of literature” (C.S. Lewis, An Experiment in Criticism, p. 96).
Non-Elect Branches
[Speaking of Romans 11 and John 15] “This does not mean that the elect can lose their salvation. But it does mean that branches can lose their position on the tree. The elect always bear fruit, and their fruit remains. And yet some false professors, with genuine historical connection to the tree, never bear fruit, …
Aesthetic Vulnerability
“We must risk being taken in, if we are to get anything. The best safeguard against bad literature is a full experience of good; just as a real and affectionate acquaintance with honest people gives a better protection against rogues than a habitual distrust of everyone” (C.S. Lewis, An Experiment in Criticism, p. 94).
The Root Supports the Branch
“But the Reformers saw that some such distinction [between visible and invisible Church] was necessary. Without it, men fall readily into the trap of thinking that all that is necessary for salvation is to be in good standing with the visible Church. And because that is something they can readily arrange, they think that all …
Art Is Not A Tupperware Container for Truth
“It is this omnipresent flavour of feel that makes bad inventions so mawkish and suffocating, and good ones so tonic. The good ones allow us temporarily to share a sort of passionate sanity. And we may also—which is less important—expect to find in them many psychological truths and profound, at least profoundly felt, reflections. But …
Literary “Realism” Mistaken for an Argument
“Authors, restrained by our laws against obscenity—rather silly laws, it may be—from using half a dozen monosyllables, felt as if they were martyrs of science, like Galileo. To the objection ‘This is obscene’ or “This is depraved’, or even to the more critically relevant objection ‘This is uninteresting’, the reply ‘This occurs in real life’ …
Balsa Wood Soaked in Lighter Fluid
“Many Christians are praying for revival, but we need to careful how we pray. The Church today is a lightweight operation, like a stack of balsa wood, soaked in lighter fluid. The consuming fire of the Holy Spirit would therefore not burn for long and would not leave much. We must pray for a doctrinal …
Uptight Grammarians, Out With Whom We Do Not Wish to Hang
“I am thinking of what I call Style-mongers. On taking up a book, these people concentrate on what they call its ‘style’ or its ‘English’. They judge this neither by its sound nor by its power to communicate but by its conformity to certain arbitrary rules. Their reading is a perpetual witch hunt for Americanisms, …
No Sense Blaming the Meat
“The only way the unbelieving world can be constrained in its external actions, in a way contrary to that unregenerate nature, is when the Church is salty. Christ taught that His followers were the salt of the earth — applied to an ungodly society in the same way salt was applied to perishable meat as …