Meditation in a Toolshed by C.S. Lewis Doodle

We must, on pain of idiocy, deny from the very outset the idea that looking AT is, by its own nature, intrinsically truer or better than looking ALONG. One must look both along and at everything. The period of scientific or ‘expert’ intimidation has got to end...

This article is in a series of five fantastic newspaper articles written for the 'Coventry Evening Telegraph' from January to May 1945, that closed out the final months of Britain's war with Nazi Germany and addressed typical atheist arguments:

(1) ‘Religion and Science’ (3 Jan. 1945);
(2) ’Who was Right? Dream Lecturer or Real Lecturer’ (21 Feb. 1945 -    • Видео   );
(3) ‘The Laws of Nature’ (4 Apr. 1945 -    • The Laws of Nature by C. S. Lewis Doodle   );
(4) ‘Work and Prayer’ (28 May 1945 –    • Work and Prayer by C.S. Lewis Doodle   ); and
(5) ‘Meditation in a Toolshed’ (17 Jul. 1945 -    • Meditation in a Toolshed by C.S. Lewis Doodle   ).

You can find the playlist of these doodles here:
   • The Coventry Conversations Series  

(2:49) Before plastics, the faces of dolls were made of wax (or china) that was skin coloured and extremely life-like, but which would shatter if dropped and could be rather traumatic for the child concerned. Wax is still used at Madame Tussauds, which displays life-like waxworks of famous and historical figures.

Atheists were trying to "debunk" the moral duty of women to look after their own children, by decrying that duty as "merely maternal instinct". Communism in Russia had made stay-at-home mothering illegal, as they must work for the Communist state within 3 months of any birth, and young children were then sent to the wolves; Socialist daycare. This reductive side-on-view is employed today also by reducing a baby to "simply a lump of cells", to somehow justify abortion. See    • Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis Doodle (BB...  

(2:55) Nascent: just beginning, budding, developing.

(3:45) See Lewis’ talk on the love between the sexes or 'Eros' (   • The Four Loves ('Eros' or 'The Love Betwee...  ).

(3:54) See Lewis' essay on chivalry called: 'The Necessity of Chivalry', written at the height of the Battle of Britain in 1940.

(4:00) See 'Men without Chests': "I had sooner play cards against a man who was quite sceptical about ethics, but bred to believe that ‘a gentleman does not cheat’, than against an irreproachable moral philosopher who had been brought up among sharpers [cardsharks, swindlers]. In battle, it is not syllogisms [logical arguments] that will keep the reluctant nerves and muscles to their post in the third hour of the bombardment."

(4:12) To browbeat: "To intimidate (someone), typically into doing something, with stern or abusive words or disconcert by a stern manner or arrogant speech." The browbeater’s cry ”We are more intelligent than you!” or “We are the experts!” is well explained in his essay “The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment” (    • The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment by C...   ) and “On Punishment” (    • On Punishment: A Reply by C.S. Lewis Doodl...   ).
On metaphysical subjects (such as God, love, morality, honour, and politics) scientific training gives no added value to a man's opinion.

(4:31) A ‘wiseacre’ is a know-it-all, a smart-alec; one who pretends to knowledge or cleverness.

(9:42) See the last chapter of the book the 'Abolition of Man': "It is no use trying to ‘see through’ first principles. If you see through everything, then everything is transparent. But a wholly transparent world is an invisible world. To ‘see through’ all things is the same as not to see."

 (9:50) See Acts 14:15 -17 which contains Barnabas and Paul's message to the men of Lystra on idol worship and crops: https://biblehub.com/acts/14-15.htm

Scriptures mentioned in doodle:
1 Samuel 12:21 (https://biblehub.com/1_samuel/12-21.htm)
Isaiah 44:6-23 (https://biblehub.com/niv/isaiah/44.htm)
Jeremiah 10:5 (https://biblehub.com/jeremiah/10-5.htm)
Matthew 6:7 (https://biblehub.com/matthew/6-7.htm)
1 Corinthians 3:7 (https://biblehub.com/1_corinthians/3-...)
1 Corinthians 10.19-20 (https://biblehub.com/1_corinthians/10...)

More on prayer and gardening here: "The two methods by which we are allowed to produce events may be called work and prayer. Both are alike in this respect - that in both we try to produce a state of affairs which God has not (or at any rate not yet) seen fit to provide "on His own"...what we do when we weed a field is not quite different from what we do when we pray for a good harvest. But there is an important difference all the same. You cannot be sure of a good harvest whatever you do to a field" (Lewis, 'Work and Prayer').