# “A warning to scholars” by C.S. Lewis

- Link: https://tollelege.net/2008/11/16/a-warning-to-scholars-by-cs-lewis/
- Published: 2008-11-16T14:57:42-06:00
- Author: tollelege

“The intellectual life is not the only road to God, nor the safest, but we find 
it to be a road, and it may be the appointed road for us. Of course, it will be 
so only so long as we keep the impulse pure and disinterested. That is the great
difficulty.

As the author of the _Theologia Germanicai_ says, we may come to love knowledge –
our knowing– more than the thing known: to delight not in the exercise of our talents
but in the fact that they are ours, or even in the reputation they bring us.

Every success in the scholar’s life increases this danger. If it becomes irresistible,
he must give up his scholarly work. The time for plucking our the right eye has 
arrived.”

–C. S. Lewis, “Learning in Wartime,” in _The Weight of Glory: And Other Addresses_(
New York: HarperCollins, 1949/2001), 57.

More quotes from [C.S. Lewis](https://tollelege.net/category/cs-lewis/)