by AllanS » August 13th, 2006, 11:10 pm
"The argument with Anscombe taught him a valuable lesson, that he was not able to prove the existence of God through reason. This was a shock, for he had relied very much on reason ever since his years with Kirkpatrick in Surrey. He came to realise that it is absurd to suppose that if a particular argument for the existence of God is overturned, this means that God does not exist. He relied henceforth on intuitive experience. What had happened to him is splendidly described in one of his finest poems, The Apologist's Evening Prayer. A belief that God was intellectual and rational had been replaced by an intuitive knowledge." George Sayer (Head of English at Malvern College, fellow Inkling and long-time friend of CSL.)
The Apologist's Evening Prayer
From all my lame defeats and oh! much more
From all the victories that I seemed to score;
From cleverness shot forth on Thy behalf
At which, while angels weep, the audience laugh;
From all my proofs of Thy divinity,
Thou, who wouldst give no sign, deliver me.
Thoughts are but coins. Let me not trust instead
Of Thee, their thin-worn image of Thy head.
From all my thoughts, even from my thoughts of Thee,
O thou fair Silence, fall, and set me free.
Lord of the narrow gate and the needle's eye,
Take from me all my trumpery lest I die.
“And turn their grief into song?" he replied. "That would be a gracious act and a good beginning."
Quid and Harmony: a fund-raising project for the Fistula Hospital, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.
www.smithysbook.com