I never heard that Arminius was called an Arminian, nor Luther a Lutheran, nor Bishop Laud a Laudian but if you be upon the knack of making Names, you best know your ends, and best know how to fit them to it.

TranscriptionĪnd now I must speak to the Accusers speeches of my self I thank you Sir that you feigned no worse against me if I am an Haeresiarcha, why would not you vouchsafe to name that Heresie which I have owned: I have given you large Field-room, in near 80 Books and few men can so write, as that a willing man may not find some words which he is able to call Heresie: A little learning, wit, or honesty, will serve for such an hereticating presumption. I have transcribed the relevant passage below. Lewis’ source in Baxter has also been known for some time (see link above): it comes from an introductory essay (“What History is Credible, and what not”) to his work C hurch-History of the Government of Bishops and Their Councils Abbreviated. Such a standard can be acquired only from the old books. The only safety is to have a standard of plain, central Christianity ( “mere Christianity” as Baxter called it) which puts the controversies of the moment in their proper perspective. In the same way sentences in a modern book which look quite ordinary may be directed at some other book in this way you may be led to accept what you would have indignantly rejected if you knew its real significance.

For instance, in his famous essay “ On the Reading of Old Books,” which originally served as an introduction to a translation of Athanasius’ On the Incarnation, Lewis says: Lewis also uses the phrase with some regularity in other writings, as indicated here.

Lewis borrowed the phrase “mere Christianity” from the seventeenth-century Puritan Richard Baxter Lewis says as much in his book called–wait for it– Mere Christianity.

Cs lewis books mere christianity