C. Lewis - The Pilgrim’s Regress

C. S. LEWIS

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Map

Preface to the Third Edition

BOOK 1 – THE DATA

1 The Rules

2 The Island

3 The Eastern Mountains

4 Leah for Rachel

5 Ichabod

6 Quem Quaeritis in Sepulchro? Non Est Hic

BOOK 2 – THRILL

1 Dixit Insipiens

2 The Hill

3 A Little Southward

4 Soft Going

5 Leah for Rachel

6 Ichabod

7 Non Est Hic

8 Great Promises

BOOK 3 – THROUGH DARKEST ZEITGEISTHEIM

1 Eschropolis

2 A South Wind

3 Freedom of Thought

4 The Man Behind the Gun

5 Under Arrest

6 Poisoning the Wells

7 Facing the Facts

8 Parrot Disease

9 The Giant Slayer

BOOK 4 – BACK TO THE ROAD

1 Let Grill Be Grill

2 Archetype and Ectype

3 Esse is Percipi

4 Escape

BOOK 5 – THE GRAND CANYON

1 The Grand Canyon

2 Mother Kirk’s Story

3 The Self-Sufficiency of Vertue

4 Mr Sensible

5 Table Talk

6 Drudge

7 The Gaucherie of Vertue

BOOK 6 – NORTHWARD ALONG THE CANYON

1 First Steps to the North

2 Three Pale Men

3 Neo-Angular

4 Humanist

5 Food from the North

6 Furthest North

7 Fool’s Paradise

BOOK 7 – SOUTHWARD ALONG THE CANYON

1 Vertue is Sick

2 John Leading

3 The Main Road Again

4 Going South

5 Tea on the Lawn

6 The House of Wisdom

7 Across the Canyon by Moonlight

8 This Side by Sunlight

9 Wisdom – Exoteric

10 Wisdom – Esoteric

11 Mum’s the Word

12 More Wisdom

BOOK 8 – AT BAY

1 Two Kinds of Monist

2 John Led

3 John Forgets Himself

4 John Finds his Voice

5 Food at a Cost

6 Caught

7 The Hermit

8 History’s Words

9 Matter of Fact

10 Archetype and Ectype

BOOK 9 – ACROSS THE CANYON

1 Across the Canyon by the Inner Light

2 This Side by Lightning

3 This Side by the Darkness

4 Securus Te Projice

5 Across the Canyon

6 Nella Sua Voluntade

BOOK 10 – THE REGRESS

1 The Same Yet Different

2 The Synthetic Man

3 Limbo

4 The Black Hole

5 Superbia

6 Ignorantia

7 Luxuria

8 The Northern Dragon

9 The Southern Dragon

10 The Brook

About the Author

Other Books By

About the Publisher

BOOK I

THE DATA

This every soul seeketh and for the sake of this doth all her actions, having an inkling that it is; but what it is she cannot sufficiently discern, and she knoweth not her way, and concerning this she hath no constant assurance as she hath of other things.

PLATO

Whose souls, albeit in a cloudy memory, yet seek back their good, but, like drunk men, know not the road home.

BOETHIUS

Somewhat it seeketh, and what that is directly it knoweth not, yet very intentive desire thereof doth so incite it, that all other known delights and pleasures are laid aside, they give place to the search of this but only suspected desire.

HOOKER

1

THE RULES

Knowledge of broken law precedes all other religious experiences – John receives his first religious instruction – Did the instructors really mean it?

I dreamed of a boy who was born in the land of Puritania and his name was John. And I dreamed that when John was able to walk he ran out of his parents’ garden on a fine morning on to the road. And on the other side of the road there was a deep wood, but not thick, full of primroses and soft green moss. When John set eyes on this he thought he had never seen anything so beautiful: and he ran across the road and into the wood, and was just about to go down on his hands and knees and to pull up the primroses by handfuls, when his mother came running out of the garden gate, and she also ran across the road, and caught John up, and smacked him soundly and told him he must never go into the wood again. And John cried, but he asked no questions, for he was not yet at the age for asking questions. Then a year went past. And then, another fine morning, John had a little sling and he went out into the garden and he saw a bird sitting on a branch. And John got his sling ready and was going to have a shot at the bird, when the cook came running out of the garden and caught John up and smacked him soundly and told him he must never kill any of the birds in the garden.

‘Why?’ said John.

‘Because the Steward would be very angry,’ said cook.

‘Who is the Steward?’ said John.

‘He is the man who makes rules for all the country round here,’ said cook.

‘Why?’ said John.

‘Because the Landlord set him to do it.’

‘Who is the Landlord?’ said John.

‘He owns all the country,’ said the cook.

‘Why?’ said John.

And when he asked this, the cook went and told his mother. And his mother sat down and talked to John about the Landlord all afternoon: but John took none of it in, for he was not yet at the age for taking it in. Then a year went past, and one dark, cold, wet morning John was made to put on new clothes. They were the ugliest clothes that had ever been put upon him, which John did not mind at all, but they also caught him under the chin, and were tight under the arms, which he minded a great deal, and they made him itch all over. And his father and mother took him out along the road, one holding him by each hand (which was uncomfortable, too, and very unnecessary), and told him they were taking him to see the Steward. The Steward lived in a big dark house of stone on the side of the road. The father and mother went in to talk to the Steward first, and John was left sitting in the hall on a chair so high that his feet did not reach the floor. There were other chairs in the hall where he could have sat in comfort, but his father had told him that the Steward would be very angry if he did not sit absolutely still and be very good: and John was beginning to be afraid, so he sat still in the high chair with his feet dangling, and his clothes itching all over him, and his eyes starting out of his head. After a very long time his parents came back again, looking as if they had been with the doctor, very grave. Then they said that John must go in and see the Steward too. And when John came into the room, there was an old man with a red, round face, who was very kind and full of jokes, so that John quite got over his fears, and they had a good talk about fishing tackle and bicycles. But just when the talk was at its best, the Steward got up and cleared his throat. He then took down a mask from the wall with a long white beard attached to it and suddenly clapped it on his face, so that his appearance was awful. And he said, ‘Now I am going to talk to you about the Landlord. The Landlord owns all the country, and it is very, very kind of him to allow us to live on it at all – very, very kind.’ He went on repeating ‘very kind’ in a queer sing-song voice so long that John would have laughed, but that now he was beginning to be frightened again. The Steward then took down from a peg a big card with small print all over it, and said, ‘Here is a list of all the things the Landlord says you must not do. You’d better look at it.’ So John took the card: but half the rules seemed to forbid things he had never heard of, and the other half forbade things he was doing every day and could not imagine not doing: and the number of the rules was so enormous that he felt he could never remember them all. ‘I hope,’ said the Steward, ‘that you have not already broken any of the rules?’ John’s heart began to thump, and his eyes bulged more and more, and he was at his wit’s end when the Steward took the mask off and looked at John with his real face and said, ‘Better tell a lie, old chap, better tell a lie. Easiest for all concerned,’ and popped the mask on his face all in a flash. John gulped and said quickly, ‘Oh, no, sir.’ ‘That is just as well,’ said the Steward through the mask. ‘Because, you know, if you did break any of them and the Landlord got to know of it, do you know what he’d do to you?’ ‘No, sir,’ said John: and the Steward’s eyes seemed to be twinkling dreadfully through the holes of the mask. ‘He’d take you and shut you up for ever and ever in a black hole full of snakes and scorpions as large as lobsters – for ever and ever. And besides that, he is such a kind, good man, so very, very kind, that I am sure you would never want to displease him.’ ‘No, sir,’ said John. ‘But, please, sir …’ ‘Well,’ said the Steward. ‘Please, sir, supposing I did break one, one little one, just by accident, you know. Could nothing stop the snakes and lobsters?’ ‘Ah!…’ said the Steward; and then he sat down and talked for a long time, but John could not understand a single syllable. However, it all ended with pointing out that the Landlord was quite extraordinarily kind and good to his tenants, and would certainly torture most of them to death the moment he had the slightest pretext. ‘And you can’t blame him,’ said the Steward. ‘For after all, it is his land, and it is so very good of him to let us live here at all – people like us, you know.’ Then the Steward took off the mask and had a nice, sensible chat with John again, and gave him a cake and brought him out to his father and mother. But just as they were going he bent down and whispered in John’s ear, ‘I shouldn’t bother about it all too much if I were you.’ At the same time he slipped the card of the rules into John’s hand and told him he could keep it for his own use.