17 C. S. Lewis Quotes on Time

C. S. Lewis quotes on time

24. Gratitude looks to the past and love to the present; fear, avarice, lust, and ambition look ahead.

29. Humans are amphibians - half spirit and half animal.... As spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time.

35. The humans live in time but our Enemy (God) destines them for eternity.

41. [Mortals] say of some temporal suffering, 'No future bliss can make up for it,' not knowing Heaven, once attained, will work backwards and turn even that agony into a glory. And of some sinful pleasure they say 'Let me have but this and I'll take the consequences': little dreaming how damnation will spread back and back into their past and contaminate the pleasure of the sin. Both processes begin even before death.

57. Now is our chance to choose the right side. God is holding back to give us that chance. It won't last forever. We must take it or leave it.

78. The doctrine of the Second Coming teaches us that we do not and cannot know when the world drama will end. The curtain may be rung down at any moment: say, before you have finished reading this paragraph.

79. The doctrine of the Second Coming has failed, so far as we are concerned, if it does not make us realize that at every moment of every year in our lives Donne's question 'What if this present were the world's last night?' is equally relevant.

85. Enough had been thought, and said, and felt, and imagined. It was about time that something should be done.

92. In those days Mr Sherlock Holmes was still living in Baker Street and the Bastables were looking for treasure in the Lewisham Road. (ch. 1)

123. 'If your Majesty is ever to use the Horn,' said Trufflehunter, 'I think the time has now come.' Caspian had of course told them of his treasure several days ago. 'We are certainly in great need,' answered Caspian. 'But it is hard to be sure we are at our greatest. Supposing there came an even worse need and we had already used it?' 'By that argument,' said Nikabrik, 'your Majesty will never use it until it is too late.' 'I agree with that,' said Doctor Cornelius. 'And what do you think, Trumpkin?' asked Caspian. 'Oh, as for me,' said the Red Dwarf, who had been listening with complete indifference, 'your Majesty knows I think the Horn - and that bit of broken stone over there and your great King Peter - and your Lion Aslan - are all eggs in moonshine. It's all one to me when your Majesty blows the Horn. All I insist on is that the army is told nothing about it. There's no good raising hopes of magical help which (as I think) are sure to be disappointed.'

141. When she had got to the third page [of another story] and come to the end, she said, 'That is the loveliest story I've ever read or ever shall read in my whole life. Oh, I wish I could have gone on reading it for ten years. At least I'll read it over again.' - But here part of the magic of the Book came into play. You couldn't turn back. The right-hand pages, the ones ahead, could be turned; the left-hand pages could not. ... 'It was about a cup and a sword and a tree and a green hill, I know that much. But I can't remember, and what shall I do?' (ch. 10)

144. 'Please, Aslan,' said Lucy, 'what do you call soon?' 'I call all times soon,' said Aslan. ... 'Come,' said the Magician. 'All times may be soon to Aslan, but in my home all hungry times are one o'clock.' (ch. 11)

158. [Aslan speaking,] He went to the door and they all followed him. He raised his head and roared, 'Now it is time!' then louder, 'Time!'; then so loud that is could have shaken the stars, 'TIME.' The Door flew open. (ch. 13)

167. All that is not eternal is eternally out of date.

175. Nothing is yet in its true form.

182. 'A pleasure is full grown only when it is remembered. You are speaking, Hman, as if the pleasure were one thing and the memory another. It is all one thing. The seroni could say it better than I say it now. Not better than I could say it in a poem. What you call remembering is the last part of the pleasure, as the crah is the last part of a poem. When you and I met, the meeting was over very shortly, it was nothing. Now it is growing something as we remember it. But still we know very little about it. What it will be when I remember it as I lie down to die, what it makes in me all my days till then-that is the real meeting. The other is only the beginning of it.' [2]

183. If there is equality, it is in His love, not in us.