The Abolition of Man, Or, Reflections on Education With Special Reference to the Teaching of English in the Upper Forms of Schools

• Publisher:   HarperOne
• Number Of Pages:   128
• Publication Date:   2001-03
• ISBN-10 / ASIN:   0060652942
• ISBN-13 / EAN:   9780060652944

C. S. Lewis sets out to persuade his audience of the importance and relevance of universal values such as courage and honor in contemporary society.

C.S. Lewis's The Abolition of Man purports to be a book specifically about public education, but its central concerns are broadly political, religious, and philosophical. In the best of the book's three essays, "Men Without Chests," Lewis trains his laser-sharp wit on a mid- century English high school text, considering the ramifications of teaching British students to believe in idle relativism, and to reject "the doctrine of objective value, the belief that certain attitudes are really true, and others really false, to the kind of thing the universe is and the kinds of things we are." Lewis calls this doctrine the "Tao," and he spends much of the book explaining why society needs a sense of objective values. The Abolition of Man speaks with astonishing freshness to contemporary debates about morality; and even if Lewis seems a bit too cranky and privileged for his arguments to be swallowed whole, at least his articulation of values seems less ego-driven, and therefore is more useful, than that of current writers such as Bill Bennett and James Dobson. --Michael Joseph Gross

It has been a long time I've posted here. I am going to try and post regularly every weekend from now on (until I run out of books to review). Perhaps I will be able to resurrect this blog. Like Mere Christianity, this book is based on things he said orally, in this case a lecture. Lewis argued that the danger we face in society is a reductionistic Scientism which ends up turning Man himself into just another object of Nature and thus totally subsumed by it. Basicallly, the paradox is that as humanity increases in technological and scientific knowledge in order to gain mastery over Nature, it also gives up a little bit of its humanity as well until human beings themselves are considered only products of Nature to be shaped at the will of their Molders. He sees a Brave New World-type situation emerging if things don't turn around. All this stems from reducing objective statements like, "This flower is majestically beautiful," to "He merely gets a happy feeling when he looks at the flower." In other words, it is taking what is an objective statement about the reality of the flower and turning it to just a subjective feeling. This gets worse when applied to moral statements. The Moral Law or the Tao that all societies have known (but of course none has fully followed) is completely denied by the above debunkers of aesthetic statements. Certainly not compeletely denied since the debunkers have values themselves that they believe are exempt from the debunking process. But if reductionism has its way, it will be more difficult for these debunkers to protect the pieces of the Tao that they do believe in from the onslaught. This is a very short book but a very important one given our current state of conflict between various worldviews.

The Abolition of Man is a series of essays detailing how the deterioration of modern education and communication has led to individuals and communities being uprooted from the moral groundings that have been consistent among cultures for thousands of years. Lewis argues that many men have become "men without chests," that is men who have no moral core and act only to the greatest advantage at any one point. With man being "abolished", or losing his soul, men and mankind are being reduced to creatures lower than animals, with not even consistent laws and instincts. Lewis believes that any society that accepts what contemporary society teaches in its schools and communication outlets will die. Lewis begins the work by critiquing a textbook that would have been common to many in Britain in the educated classes during the mid 20th century. He then builds this specific example to talk about common moral laws among all people throughout the world. Finally, Lewis argues that the pretentious claims of man against the world (and by proxy against God) ultimately do not make claims against God or nature, but do nothing more than allow man to turn on himself. Lewis illustrated the world's common morality by defining all the common moral encouragements and discouragements under the term Tao. While the traditional term has been natural law, Lewis expands his definition of moral laws generally acknowledged to be true because he wishes to expand natural law to its farthest possible point by including all laws from all peoples around the world. After beginning with a simple textbook review, Lewis to takes on one of the largest tasks anyone could possibly take on, that of calling for objective reality in a world that refuses to believe in t and prefers an increasingly narrow set of subjective thoughts and actions. Lewis is convinced that some men, in claim of defeating nature, actually redefine nature for other men (even at the smallest level between friends) and for those that redefine nature, morality becomes "I want" rather than "I should". Probably no other book that Lewis wrote had such a direct appeal to the secular world. The Abolition of Man is an early call against post-modernism before it became evident in the popular culture (by use of the textbooks that Lewis read). Totalitarianism, divorce culture, business ethics, bioethics, government entitlements, and much of popular music today are beholden to contemporary thought which has even rejected the claims of the Enlightenment's Modernism. Man, starting from himself, in hopes of finding solutions to the world and how to live within it has collapsed on himself in actions that are manipulative and deceitful to himself and others. Lewis is attempting to get modern man to understand the futility of abject amorality before he even begins to argue for theism or even the redemptive claims of Christ. The Abolition of Man is a work of preevangelism for a postmodern world. For the modern church, these essays speak words of encouragement and warning. The church in the present world is encouraged that they do hold words of ultimate reality that stand beyond instinct or mere knowledge education. As a word of warning, this book tells the modern church that it lives in a culture of subjective truth, and should respond accordingly, when it points towards objectivity.

I was a bit frustrated with this book. Now, according to C.S. Lewis in "The Abolition of Man", there were some educators in his time who, by an extension of their teachings, would say that because I found this book frustrating, I am actually saying that I am frustrating myself. C.S. Lewis would argue (and does argue in the first lecture in this three lecture book) that that's not the case. It's nice to know. There are some really nice points in this book, particularly in that first lecture, and it helps you understand why some characters in C.S. Lewis' book "That Hideous Strength" (an Earth-bound sci-fi that feels like George Orwell in some parts) are the way they are. On the other hand, I found it to be a difficult book. They'd argue I'm therefore a difficult person, those educators C.S. Lewis mentions. C.S. Lewis would argue against that as well. That's nice too. It's a short piece, "The Abolition of Man", but I got through it rather slowly. There's more big words than in any other C.S. Lewis book I've read. But that isn't probably the problem, new words can be fun. No, I felt a lot of fear, and something that could be called duty in C.S. Lewis' arguments, and some of it, some of it felt a little pushy. He also mentions what I believe is a belief in evolution. He speaks of some people he doesn't agree with as "trousered apes" and when talking about man's struggle against "nature", he mentions that it has been going on for millions of years. Now, I'm a Christian, and I was a bit shocked at this, even though I kind of figured that C.S. Lewis believed this sort of thing from some comments in "Reflections on the Psalms". A lot of people, who believe in creation, quote books like "Mere Christianity" all the time. Who knew, you know? Anyway, I was reading the "Tao Te Ching", the text close to the heart of Taoists (which C.S. Lewis alludes to in "The Abolition of Man"), and I came across something interesting in the 11th chapter/poem there. It said: "If you hold ever fast
To that most ancient Way,
You may govern today.
Call truly that knowledge
Of primal beginnings
The clue to the Way." Now, "The Abolition of Man" is about education, and of the value of things, both morally and of ancient and, for want of a better word, archetypal things. It is also about those who lead, who govern and adminsiter said education. Jesus said, according to at least one of the gospel accounts that he was the Way, the Truth and the Life. This is only a theory, but maybe C.S. Lewis, being familiar with the Tao, was investigating knowledge of "primal beginnings" as "a clue to the Way" (i.e. Christ) in his dabbling with the theory of evolution. I mean, to really know you'd have to ask him. If you're interested in C.S. Lewis' views in this book (regarding values and such), "That Hideous Strength" (which was also written during the second world war, as "The Abolition of Man" was) is a very vivid and enjoyable revelation of them. If you're after my recommendation, I'd read that before this one. Enjoy this one though.

I've been reading many of Lewis' works lately and most have been related to Christian themes. Though this book could be considered Christian, in reality it is a general philosophical work discussing the fact that there are absolute truths recognized by all people and cultures. This essay starts out as a review of an English grammar book that uses examples of writing to say that illustrate that when a person is claiming something is sublime; that thing is not really sublime, but only the opinion of the speaker. This launches Lewis into his essay on the fact that some things really are good and not subjective. He makes a case that it is our responsibility to teach children that there is a difference between good and bad, beautiful and ugly, etc. He notes that children need to be taught universal truths; they don't necessarily come naturally. He uses the concept of the Tao, which are the universal moralities of almost all cultures. This universal Tao sounds a lot like what some call the conscience, or in LDS usage the Light of Christ. I strongly agree with Lewis that there are absolute truths out there, and one of our goals in life is to learn these truths. Any society that does not embrace these truths is in trouble. I highly recommend this essay. It got me thinking and again made me appreciate Lewis power of expressing profound truths.

In this philosophical essay, C.S. Lewis uses a high school text to make two main points. First, he argues that intellectuals of the day were trying discredit anything not based on the scientific method--for example emotions and values. He referred to this as creating "men without chests." Secondly, he argues that in doing so, these intellectuals were also teaching that morality and values were completely relative. Lewis goes on to show that although the intellectuals thought mankind was becoming more in control of nature through science--it actually was becoming more under nature's control. This is typical C.S. Lewis although slightly more difficult than some of his other writings.

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