Sunday, February 21, 2010

Quotables: Aristotle and Piper

We say that some peole who do just actions are not thereby just, if, for instance, they do the actions prescribed by the laws either unwillingly or because of some other end, not because of the actions themselves, even though they do the right actions, those that the excellent person ought to do.

- Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, IV, 12.15-19

(Lewis) demonstrated for me and convinced me that rigorous, precise, penetrating logic is not inimical to deep soul-stirring feeling, vivid lively imagination. He was a romantic rationalist. He combined what almost everybody today assumes are mutually exclusive, rationalism and poetry, cool logic, warm feelings, disciplined prose, free imagination. And in shattering these old stereotypes for me he freed me to think hard and write poetry, argue for the resurrection and compose a hymn to Christ, smash an argument and hug a friend, demand a definition and use a metaphor. It's a wonderful thing when a great man shows a struggler how to be himself.

- Piper on C.S. Lewis

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