The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water. ~~ C.S. Lewis
The moment you have self at all, there is the possibility of putting yourself first - wanting to be the center- wanting to be God in fact. That was the sin of Satan: and that was the sin he taught the human race ~~ C.S. Lewis
The sweetest thing in all my life has been the longing — to reach the Mountain, to find the place where all the beauty came from ~~ C.S. Lewis
We do not want to merely see beauty
We want something else which can
hardly be put into words
To be united to the beauty we see
To pass into it, to receive it into ourselves
To bathe in it, to become part of it
C.S. Lewis said of hell,
“There is no doctrine which I would more willingly remove from Christianity than this, if it lay in my power. But it has the full support of Scripture and, specially, of our Lord’s own words; it has always been held by Christendom; and it has the support of reason”
“Pride gets no pleasure out of having something, only out of having more of it than the next man… It is the comparison that makes you proud: the pleasure of being above the rest. Once the element of competition is gone, pride is gone.”
Not often that I disagree with Saint Clive 
But I think each thing he said in that quote (re: hell) is wrong.
The vice I am talking of is Pride or Self-Conceit: and the virtue opposite to it, in Christian morals, is called Humility. You may remember, when I was talking about sexual morality, I warned you that the center of Christian morals did not lie there. Well, now, we have come to the centre. According to Christian teachers, the essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride. Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison: it was through Pride that the devil became the devil: Pride leads to every other vice: it is the complete anti-God state of mind. ~~ C.S. Lewis
St. Clive he is. He was dead on target about pride in the post right above this one though. It’s been my experience anyway. From ego all vices spring.
Oh yes, I agree. And St. C is still a hero of mine
I don’t agree with him about praise and reason. I’m a pacifist and he wasn’t. Praise should be God centered. Godly affirmations give the glory to God. Things like:
I thank God for you
You are a blessing
Thank God! I’m blessed
Good job. Be blessed
Thank you Jesus for this gift
God’s has really gifted you with a talent
I really appreciate that. But God is the one who has blessed me.
Praise God!
We reach closer union by faith in God not reason. The stronger the faith the closer the union. As Johnathan Edwards states:
If therefore we see any of the followers of Christ, in the midst of the most violent, unreasonable and wicked opposition, of God’s and his own enemies, maintaining under all this temptation, the humility, quietness, and gentleness of a lamb, and the harmlessness, and love, and sweetness of a dove, we may well judge that there is a good soldier of Jesus Christ - Jonathan Edwards
If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. ~~ C. S. Lewis
Falling in love with God is a process and takes time. C.S. Lewis didn’t call it “Falling in love” but he described it nonetheless. This ecstasy of love, hope, beauty and wonder of union is what C.S. Lewis called “Joy”. This is the desire he spoke about in the previous quote. C.S. Lewis’s argument from Desire is my favorite. It’s the most personal and intimate. Like Alvin Plantinga I don’t think it requires an argument though. It just rises up within.
If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. ~~ C. S. Lewis
Where does MacDonald say this?
The happiness which God designs for His higher creatures is the happiness of being freely, voluntarily united to Him and to each other in an ecstasy of love and delight compared with which the most rapturous love between a man and a woman on this earth is mere milk and water. ~~ C.S. Lewis
Did Lewis quote this as from MacDonald’s writing? I was unable to find it. However I did find the following one:
What’s Mine’s Mine 202-3
I don’t know. I’m just wondering if he ever said anything about union. Where does MacDonald speak on the union experience?
I think you answered before I edited my previous post. Please note that I included a somewhat similar quote from GMD. I did not find any quotes on “union” but I did find a lot on “self.” Here are two:
Alec Forbes of Howglen 151
Unspoken Sermons Series II 155
That sounds like union to me. When we lose ourselves we come into union with love. Here’s how the Catholic Thomas Dubay says it in my book “The Evidential Power of Beauty”:
We first center our attention on the union aspect of this summit, a marvelous oneness between God and man. We do not become Divine in a literal sense. This union is a remarkable oneness of the human will with the Divine will, and the transfiguring likeness that results. Being head over heals in love with the Lord, man at this pinnacle of prayer intimacy is now freed from all selfish clinging’s and possesses an inner purity from anything ungodly ~~ Thomas Dubay
In “The Four Loves” C.S. Lewis speaks on the intrinsic worth of man
On the next page he goes on to say:
Indeed he says:
Clearly our worth isn’t inherent but derived from God.