On the Incarnation by St. Athanasius

(Yonkers: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 318/2011), 110

Preface by C. S. Lewis

On reading old books (PDF):

  • "It is a good rule, after reading a new book, never to allow yourself another new one till you have read an old one in between. If that is too much for you, you should at least read one old one to every three new ones."
  • "Every age has its own outlook. It is specially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes. We all, therefore, need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. And that means the old books."
  • "The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books."
  • "Two heads are better than one, not because either is infallible, but because they are unlikely to go wrong in the same direction."
  • "Measured against the ages "mere Christianity" turns out to be no insipid interdenominational transparency, but something positive, self-consistent, and inexhaustible."
  • World War II: "We are proud that our own country has more than once stood against the world."

Notes

  • "For God has not only created us from nothing, but also granted us by the grace of the Word to live a life according to God." (54)
  • "Being the Word of the Father and above all, he alone consequently was both able to recreate the universe and was worthy to suffer on behalf of all and to intercede for all before the Father." (56)
  • "Although being himself powerful and the creator of the universe, he prepared for himself in the Virgin the body as a temple, and made it his own, as an instrument, making himself known and dwelling in it." (57)
  • "worshiping the creation rather than the Creator" (cf. Rom-01, The Pulley; 61)

Notes started: 2021-08-18
Last updated: 2022-12-28-Wed