The Trouble
with X...
Excerpt from God in the Dock, C. S. Lewis
I suppose I may assume that seven out
of ten of those who read these lines are in some kind of difficulty about some
other human being. Either at work or at home, either the people who employ you
or those whom you employ, either those who share your house or those whose
house you share, either your in-laws or parents or children, your wife or your
husband, are making life harder for you than it need be even in these days. It
is hoped that we do not often mention these difficulties (especially the
domestic ones) to outsiders. But sometimes we do. An outside friend asks us why
we are looking so glum, and the truth comes out.
On such occasions the outside friend
usually says, "But why don't you tell them? Why don't you go to your wife
(or husband, or father, or daughter, or boss, or landlady, or lodger) and have
it all out? People are usually reasonable. All you've got to do is to make them
see things in the right light. Explain it to them in a reasonable, quiet,
friendly way." And we, whatever we say outwardly, think sadly to
ourselves, "He doesn't know X." We do. We know how utterly hopeless
it is to make X see reason. Either we've tried it over and over again--tried
till we are sick of trying it--or else we've never tried because we saw from
the beginning how useless it would be. We know that if we attempt to "have
it all out with X" there will be a "scene", or else X will stare
at us in blank amazement and say "I don't know what on earth you're
talking about"; or else (which is perhaps worst of all) X will quite agree
with us and promise to turn over a new leaf and put everything on a new
footing--and then, twenty-four hours later, will be exactly the same as X has
always been.
You know, in fact, that any attempt to
talk things over with X will shipwreck on the old, fatal flaw in X's character.
And you see, looking back, how all the plans you have ever made always have
shipwrecked on that fatal flaw--on X's incurable jealousy, or laziness, or
touchiness, or muddle-headedness, or bossiness, or ill temper, or
changeableness. Up to a certain age you have perhaps had the illusion that some
external stroke of good fortune--an improvement in health, a rise of salary,
the end of the war--would solve your difficulty. But you know better now. The war
is over, and you realize that even if the other things happened, X would still
be X, and you would still be up against the same old problem. Even if you
became a millionaire, your husband would still be a bully, or your wife would
still nag, or your son would still drink, or you'd still have to have your
mother-in-law live with you.
It is a great step forward to realize
that this is so; to face up to the fact that even if all external things went
right, real happiness would still depend on the character of the people you
have to live with--and that you can't alter their characters. And now comes the
point. When you have seen this you have, for the first time, had a glimpse of
what it must be like for God. For of course, this is (in one way) just what God
Himself is up against. He has provided a rich, beautiful world for people to
live in. He has given them intelligence to show them how it ought to be used.
He has contrived that the things they need for their biological life (food,
drink, rest, sleep, exercise) should be positively delightful to them. And,
having done all this, He then sees all His plans spoiled--just as our little
plans are spoiled--by the crookedness of the people themselves. All the things
He has given them to be happy with they turn into occasions for quarreling and
jealousy, and excess and hoarding, and tomfoolery...
But... there are two respects in which
God's view must be very different from ours. In the first place, He sees (like
you) how all the people in your home or your job are in various degrees awkward
or difficult; but when He looks into that home or factory or office He sees one
more person of the same kind--the one you never do see. I mean, of course,
yourself. That is the next great step in wisdom--to realize that you also are just
that sort of person. You also have a fatal flaw in your character. All the
hopes and plans of others have again and again shipwrecked on your character
just as your hopes and plans have shipwrecked on theirs.
It is no good passing this over with
some vague, general admission such as "Of course, I know I have my
faults." It is important to realize that there is some really fatal flaw
in you: something which gives others the same feeling of despair which their flaws give you. And it is almost
certainly something you don't know about--like what the advertisements call
"halitosis", which everyone notices except the person who has it. But
why, you ask, don't the others tell me? Believe me, they have tried to tell you
over and over and over again. And you just couldn't "take it".
Perhaps a good deal of what you call their "nagging" or "bad
temper"... are just their attempts to make you see the truth. And even the
faults you do know you don't know fully. You say, "I admit I lost my
temper last night"; but the others know that you always doing it, that you
are a bad-tempered person. You say, "I admit I drank too much last
Saturday"; but every one else know that you are a habitual drunkard.
This is one way in which God's view
must differ from mine. He sees all the characters: I see all except my own. But
the second difference is this. He loves the people in spite of their faults. He
goes on loving. He does not let go. Don't say, "It's all very well for
Him. He hasn't got to live with them." He has. He is inside them as well
as outside them. He is with them far more intimately and closely and
incessantly that we can ever be. Every vile thought within their minds (and
ours), every moment of spite, envy, arrogance, greed, and self-conceit comes
right up against His patient and longing love, and grieves His Spirit more than
it grieves ours.
The more we can imitate God in both
these respects, the more progress we shall make. We must love X more; and we
must learn to see ourselves as a person of exactly the same kind. Some people
say it is morbid to always be thinking of one's own faults. That would be all
very well if most of us could stop thinking of our own without soon beginning
to think about those of other people. For unfortunately we enjoy thinking about other people's faults: and in the
proper sense of the word "morbid", that is the most morbid pleasure
in the world.
We don't like rationing which is
imposed upon us, but I suggest one form of rationing which we ought to impose
on ourselves. Abstain from all thinking about other people's faults, unless you
duties as a teacher or parent make it necessary to think about them. Whenever
the thoughts come unnecessarily into one's mind, why not simply shove them
away? And think of one's own faults instead? For there, with God's help, one can do something. Of all the awkward people in your
house or job there is only one whom you can improve very much. That is the
practical end at which to begin. And really, we'd better. The job has got to be
tackled some day; and every day we put it off will make it harder to begin.
What, after all, is the alternative?
You see clearly enough that nothing... can make X really happy as long as X
remains envious, self-centered, and spiteful. Be sure that there is something
inside you which, unless it is altered, will put it out of God's power to
prevent your being eternally miserable. While that something remains, there can
be no Heaven for you, just as there can be no sweet smells for a man with a
cold in the nose, and no music for a man who is deaf. It's not a question of
God "sending" us to Hell. In each of us there is something growing up
which will of itself be Hell unless it is nipped in the bud. The matter is
serious: let us put ourselves in His hands at once--this very day, this hour.
