2,254 Quotes by C. S. Lewis

If you think of this world as a place simply intended for our happiness, you find it quite intolerable: think of it as a place for training and correction and it's not so bad.

The future is something which everyone reaches at the rate of 60 minutes an hour, whatever he does, whoever he is.

And above all, you must be asking which door is the true one; not which pleases you best by its paint and panelling…the question should never be: ‘Do I like that kind of service?’ but ‘Are these doctrines true: Is holiness there? Does my conscience move me towards this? Is my reluctance to move to this door due to my pride, or my mere taste, or my personal dislike for this particular door-keeper?

We live, in fact, in a world starved for solitude, silence, and private: and therefore starved for meditation and true friendship.

Solemnity is proper in church, but things that are proper in church are not necessarily proper outside, and vice versa. For example, I can say a prayer while washing my teeth, but that does not mean I should wash my teeth in church.

Good and evil increase at compound interest. That's why the little decisions we make every day are of infinite importance.

We forgive, we mortify our resentment; a week later some chain of thought carries us back to the original offence and we discover the old resentment blazing away as if nothing had been done about it at all. We need to forgive our brother seventy times seven not only for 490 offences but for one offence.

Miracles do not, in fact, break the laws of nature.

Every natural love will rise again and live forever in this country: but none will rise again until it has been buried.