# “We do not know the play” by C.S. Lewis

- Link: https://tollelege.net/2009/08/03/we-do-not-know-the-play-by-c-s-lewis/
- Published: 2009-08-03T21:05:10-05:00
- Author: tollelege

“The doctrine of the Second Coming teaches us that we do not and cannot know when
the world drama will end. The curtain may be rung down at any moment: say, before
you have finished reading this paragraph. This seems to some people intolerably 
frustrating. So many things would be interrupted. Perhaps you were going to get 
married next month, perhaps you were going to get a raise next week: you may be 
on the verge of a great scientific discovery; you may be maturing great social and
political reforms.

Surely no good and wise God would be so very unreasonable as to cut all this short?
Not _now_, of all moments! But we think thus because we keep assuming that we know
the play. We do not know the play. We do not even know whether we are in Act I or
Act V. We do not know who are the major and who the minor characters. The Author
knows.”

–C.S. Lewis, “The World’s Last Night,” in _[The World’s Last Night And Other Essays](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062643517?tag=toletaupanre-20)_(
New York: Harvest, 1952), 105.

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