American Academy of Religion

Aldous Huxley and C. S. Lewis: Novelists of Two Religions Author(s): Chad Walsh Source: Journal of Bible and Religion, Vol. 14, No. 3 (Aug., 1946), pp. 139-143 Published by: Oxford University Press Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1456006 . Accessed: 09/09/2011 12:27
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Aldous Huxley and C. S. Lewis

Novelists of Two Religions
CHAD WALSH

HERE arefourideologies suffi- to the pretty picture of man's essential goodwith cient appeal to enlist a respectable ness, and the irrational nature of Naziism amount of support from writers destroyed the cozy illusion that the struggle in the English-speaking world today. for survival and bread is the only explanation The first is what I shall call-for lack of of human actions. The mood of the intellectuals is sharply a better term--the Established Religion. This is an amorphous blend of many ideas reflected in the book stores. As usual, the and attitudes, varying considerably according publishers' lists are ahead of the Gallup Poll. to the education and sophistication of the Most of the leaders of the EstablishedReligion individual. In its more popular forms it are dead or in their old age. H. G. Wells has includes these articles of faith: Man is natu- lost his optimism, and John Dewey is fighting a rally good; the evil in life is a result of environ- rearguardaction. The second ideology, Marxism, is perhaps ment; history is the record of how man has toward individual and stronger than ever with the man in the street. gradually progressed social perfection; science is the means whereby The military prestige of the USSR and a every variety of truth can be discovered, and vague "wave-of-the-future"feeling have reinis also the source of the techniques which forced the appeal of the Marxist criticism of will make utopia possible in the near future. capitalistic society. But among the intellecThe Established Religion is often agnostic tuals, Marxism is weaker-or at least more in its metaphysical assumptions; more often divided and confused-than it was during the it is simply too earth-and-man-centeredto Popular Front period in the 'thirties. The care. Occasionally it acquires vaguely theo- Berlin-MoscowPact of 1939, which converted logical trimmings: a life-force or emergent World War II into a struggle of rival imperialGod is thrown in for good measure, or the isms, and the German attack on the USSR language of Christianity is used poetically to in 1941, which changed World War II into a show-down between democracy and fascism, express some of its ideas. The man in the street is still largely faithful left the heads of many fellow-travelersswimto the Established Religion. The influence ming. The Marxist movement has become so of such major prophets as H. G. Wells and thoroughly identifiedwith one nation that any John Dewey is by no means spent. New Marxist treads a lonely path if he tries to frontiers are still being conquered. The avoid fixing his eyes on the USSR as the appeal of the Established Religion is especially New Jerusalem. Such is the case of Arthur strong among people who have risen in the Koestler, whose book, The Yogi and the Comeducational scale, and are wide eyed with missar, is the product of his dilemma: he wonder at the ideas that were the latest thing studied Russia at first hand and emergedwith 50 years ago. the conviction that Marxism is perverted and its continued appeal to the general half-abandonedthere; now he finds himself in Despite public, the Established Religion is beginning a political vacuum, trying to be a Marxist to lose ground with the intellectuals. The without being a Russophile, and bitterly two world wars, with their revelation of the cursed by all the Marxists who equate loyalty diabolic depths of human nature, gave the lie to Marxism with loyalty to the USSR. 139

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has, for the last 50 or 75 years, been losing many of its most intelligent followers to the rival faiths. Only in the last decade has the tide turned to any considerableextent among the intellectuals. As a sign of the renewedinterest in religion, consider the case of two of the most brilliant British writers, who have deliberately taken that art-form-of-all-work, the novel, and turned it into a medium of religious propaganda. The fact that two intellectuals of REVOLT AGAINST SECULARISM their standing do this at all is amazing to anyIn the revolt against the two secular one familiarwith the intellectualclimate of the philosophies and their superficiality, two 'twenties and 'thirties; a comparison of the religious movements have come to the fore: two novelists is worth while as a means of the "PerennialPhilosophy" and Christianity. bringing out the likenesses and dissimilarities The Perennial Philosophy-a term coined of the two religions that seem destined to by Leibniz and popularizedby Aldous Huxley compete for the favor of the intellectuals and -is "the metaphysic that recognizes a divine ultimately for the loyalty of the man in Reality substantial to the world of things and the street: the Perennial Philosophy and lives and minds; the psychology that finds in Christanity. the soul something similar to, or even identical APOSTLE OF THE PERENNIAL PHILOSOPHY with, divine Reality; the ethic that places Aldous Huxley, the grandson of Thomas man's final end in the knowledgeof the immanent and transcendent Ground of all being."' Henry Huxley, could have been a brilliant Describedby Aldous Huxley as the "Highest biologist like his elder brother, Julian, but Common Factor" in all theologies, the Peren- he chose instead to become a writer and nial Philosophy has reached its highest eventually an apostle of the Perennial development in India. There have been Philosophy. In Huxley's early novels he seemed to take plenty of European mystics of the Perennial within the Christiantradition, a sardonicpleasurein analyzing human nature Philosophy type but the philosophy, taken by itself, still has in terms of glands and the neural system; rather an exotic flavor to a non-Asiatic. The there was much of the misanthropic scientist number of its followers is certainly very small and little of the future prophet. His charin England and America. The small group, acters were so uniformly unlovable that few however, includes some distinguished names. of his readers, 20 years ago, could have In addition to Huxley, there is the British suspected that he would ever esteem humanity poet and novelist, Christopher Isherwood enough to think it worthy of salvation from (W. H. Auden's collaboratorin days gone by), its baseness. as well as Gerald Heard. And yet, in the very intensity of Huxley's Christianity, of course, has never lost its loathing for human baseness there was implied statistical hold on the man in the street, but a despairing sense of what man might be but the figures on Church membership are no was not. Like Swift, when he wrote Gulliver's guide to the actual extent to which it occupies Travels, Huxley lashed out savagely at huthe place of first loyalty in the minds and hearts manity because it did not know its own poof church-goers. Undoubtedly many nominal tentialities. Christians are actually followers of the EstabAs early as 1931 the ideas of the later lished Religion, and undoubtedly Christianity Huxley can be seen taking shape. In his The Established Religion, then, has declined in the favor of the intellectuals because its optimistic picture of human nature has not been borne out by the facts, and Marxism has declined for very much the same reasons: the Marxist Russians have turnedout to be human beings, very much like our neighborson Main Street. In both philosophies, the understanding of human nature was too shallow and too external.

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Music At Night and Other Essays,2 he com- After Many a Summer Dies the Swans (1939) ments on the decline of faith in Christianity, and TimeMust Have a Stop3(1944). The first of these two novels is ostensibly progress, and humanitarianism, and points the growth of a skeptical frame of mind the story of an American millionaire who out which finds it difficult "to believe in anything hires a brilliant young doctor to discover but untranscendentalrealities." Huxley goes for him the secret of eternal life (on earth). The quest leads to the basement of an English on to say: The modernemphasis on personality. We justify country house, where a two-centuries-old is our feelingsand moods by an appeal to the "rightto nobleman and his equally aged mistress are ... the happiness," "righi to self-expression." In other discovered in excellent health, thanks to a we claim to do what we like, not becausedoing special diet; the only inconvenience is that words, what we like is in harmonywith some supposedabsohave meanwhile turned into apes. lute good,but becauseit is goodin itself. A poorjusti- they to makemen (Man is a case of arrested development; he ficationand one whichis hardlysufficient and courageous active. Andyet modemcircumstances ordinarily dies in time to avoid becoming an are such that it is only in terms of this sort of "idea" ape.)
that we can hope successfullyto rationalizeour emotional and impulsive behaviour.... Whether such "LIBERATION" as are rationalizations as good,pragmatically speaking, The real hero of the novel is Mr. Propter, entiin the old rationalizations termsof transcendental I do not know. On the whole, I ratherdoubt it. who engages the other characters in long ties, But they are the best, it seemsto me, that the modern philosophical discussions. "Actual good is will circumstances allow us to make. defines the ideal

In the same collection of essays Huxley expresses certain misgivings about the utopian society of the future. "The law of diminishing returns holds good in almost every part of our human universe," he says, and cites the sad case of the man who reaches his maximum of contentment with three-quarters of a bottle of Burgundy, and then steadily declines in happiness as he progresses from bottle to bottle. Huxley then applies the same principle to education, democracy, and travel, and concludes that the chances of increased happiness in a scientificutopia are not encouraging. This theme, of course, finds its brilliant expression in the novel, Brave New World, which came out in 1932 and describes a society so utopian that the inhabitants while away their boredomby a liberaluse of harmlessnarcotics. It is only in the last five years, however, that Huxley has become thoroughly won over to a "transcendental" ideal and has set out to win converts. The Perennial Philosophy is Huxley's most systematic presentation of mysticism, but for the benefit of readers who want their religion sweetened with a little fiction he has written two novels which are actually glorified tracts:

outside time," he states, and of liberation: "liberation from personality, liberation from times and craving, liberation into union with God." Mr. Propter seems to despair of any largescale efforts to benefit mankind. He is working on a grass-roots basis by organizing a small farming community of Okies in Cali-

fornia, and hopes to perfect a machinefor

utilizing sun-power so that the group will be largely independent of the mass-production world outside. Time Must Have a Stop is written with perhaps more charity and compassion than any of Huxley's other novels. Even when he describes characters that represent everything he loathes, the tone is one more of pity than contempt. As in the earlier novel, there is a perennial philosopher (Bruno) to provide comments and exemplify the mystical way of life. But he occupies less space than did Mr. Propter, and Sebastian, the hero, plays more than a nominal r-le. Actually, the novel is the story of his growing up from adolescence, and the experiences that finally lead him into becoming a mystic. One of the miost memorable passages in

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CHAD WALSH planet all worship the same God that Christians worshipon the Earth. The second novel, Perelandra, describes Ransom's adventures on Venus. He is transported there by supernatural means, having been summoned to save the Adam and Eve of the planet from the machinations of the Devil. The latter is operating through a half-demented scientist, Weston, who travels to Venus in his space-ship and spends the greater part of the book trying to induce the new Eve to violate the one direct prohibition that God has imposed on her and her husband (they must not spend the night on fixed landtheir usual habitat is a paradisical floating island). Ransom eventually emerges victor, though only after he abandons words and relies on his fists. Mankind on Venus is thus spared the calamitous consequencesof a Fall and Original Sin. The book ends on a strong eschatological note. Ransom is given to understandby the Adam of the planet that the long isolation of the Earth (the tutelary spirits of the other planets have drawn a cordonsanitaire around it) is coming to an end, and the show-down between good and evil can be expected at any time. The show-down comes in That Hideous Strength.' The forces of evil have organized the N.I.C.E. (National Institute of Co*rdinated Experiments) and plan through its appeal to the utopian dreams of people to gain control first of England and then of the whole world. Hell is trying to incarnate itself on Earth. It very nearly succeeds, but ultimately the victory is won by forces of good under the leadership of Ransom-aided by Merlin, who has emerged from his state of suspended animation. The end of the novel is strongly reminiscent of the Book of Revelation.

the book describes the experiences of Uncle Eustace, who dies of heart failure after a life of wine, women, and song. Huxley reaches a new height of poignancy as he pictures the way the man's soul struggles against losing its identity in the Infinite, and prefers instead to cherish cheap memories of mistresses and cigars as a means of preserving personality.
APOSTLE OF THE FAITH

C. S. Lewis, who lectures on medieval English literature at Oxford, is so well known for The Screwtape Letters that people forget he has written more than half a dozen other books, all designed to win converts to Christianity. Lewis' life-story, on the surface, seems familiar enough. He turned from Christianity at fourteen, and returned to it when about thirty. The unusual thing about Lewis is the fervor with which he threw himself into the business of winning converts, and the amazing literary skill and versatility he could summon to his aid. Thanks to his urbane style, clarity, sense of humor,and psychological acuteness, he has become perhaps the most effective Christian apologist among the unchurched and skeptical.
INTERPLANETARY CHRISTIANITY

Lewis' three interplanetary novels are probably the least noticed of his books, and they are also the ones in which his mission is least obvious. But the purpose is there, none the less. Superficially, the novels are tales of flitting from one planet to another, but they add up to a picture of the universe which presupposesChristianity. The first of the three novels, Out of the Silent Planet,4 describes life on the planet Mars. Ransom, a Cambridge philologist, CONTRASTS arrives on Mars via space-ship and discovers three species of rational beings, living in such If we compare the propagandistic novels harmony together that they have no concept of Huxley and Lewis, it is clear that Huxley of war and no word for "bad;" their nearest is the more forthright of the two writers. equivalent is "bent." The inhabitants of the He uses the familiar technique of the roman

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a th se: creates a plot which provides enough Discussing the Sacraments in The Case for
Christianity,4Lewis says, "There's no good trying to be more spiritual than God. God never meant man to be a purely spiritual creature." The interplanetary novels contain many very sensuous descriptionsof landscapes and foods, and treat the mating impulse as one of the good things of life. The question of personality also brings the two writers into sharp contrast. Huxley seems to regard personality as evil in itself, and views the absorption of the individual into the Godhead as the ultimate good. To Lewis, not absorption into God, but sonship under God and service of God, is the aim-and he pictures this subordination to God as bringing out the personality more clearly than ever-the saints seem so much more individual than do the tyrants of history. Finally, Huxley is much the more quietistic of the two. His despair of the world of events is much blacker. He seems to see little hope for humanity at large today. The most that can be hoped for is that a few people here and there will seek the truth and work out their own salvation. Both writers, with their novels and other books, are providing students of religion with easily digested material to dispel one of the popular fables of recent years: the idea that all religions are "essentially the same." The To be adequateto our experiencethe myth would ... have to be modified it wouldhave to makeclearthat more Huxley and Lewis elaborate their two creation,the incomprehensible passagefromthe unman- faiths, the more the basic differencescome into ifested One into the manifest multiplicityof nature, sharp relief. from eternity into time, is not merelythe preludeand action to give the charactersa chance to utter the sentiments he wants to put across. Lewis has his characters do very little preaching or philosophizing. He drives home his message in a more subtle way: by creating a picture of life on the different planets which makes no sense unless Christianity is true, and by making the picture so sensuously real that it is difficult to put down one of his novels and dismiss it as "mere escape fiction." There is one striking agreementbetween the two authors. Both are in violent revolt against the current worship of science and the cult of inevitable progress. Huxley regards science as good, bad, or indifferent,depending on how it is used, and he seems to think that at present it is merely making the road to true spiritual progress harder for the average individual. Lewis sees science as something not objectionablein itself but easily perverted to demonic ends. The most striking differencebetween Huxley and Lewis is their attitude toward the material world and the human body. So far as I know, Huxley has never written a book in which sexual love was described in a sympathetic way, and one suspects that his disgust extends to all matter. In The Perennial Philosophy, when discussing the story of the Fall, he says:
necessaryconditionof the Fall; to someextent it is the Fall.
* Reprinted from The Living Church,April 28, 1946. 1Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy, Harper & Brothers, 1945. 2Doubleday Doran & Company, Inc., N. Y. 3Harper & Brothers, N. Y. 4 The Macmillan Company, N. Y.

Lewis on the contrary, evidently believes with the late William Temple that "Christianity is the most materialisticof all religions."