A challenge for me personally to fully comprehend Lewis’ thoughts and arguments, but I got the jist.

Not my favourite Lewis, but I may have read it in the wrong frame of mind and without sufficient focus.

It's an odd little book, on the one hand combatting colourless modernism + scientism in education, but on the other appealing to a universal Tao which stands opposed to such modernism / scientism.

I'm not satisfied with how he hand waves over significant differences between various belief systems to build his Tao, nor with how sometimes (in a typical Lewis move) he throws legitimate science under the bus, seeing in it something sinister and unmaking.

The work is also more than usually of its time. Which does NOT mean we cannot learn from it. Far from it! But it does mean we've moved from the principle battle being fought in this book (against state-planned eugenicisms of mind and body, which threatened to abolish humanity), and thus the threat strikes with far less force.

I'll definitely have to revisit this as it is deep and far reaching.

I heard someone call this book prophetic.. it truly feels like it. Much of the world that Lewis describes that could be a result of the indoctrination of students in school using books like "the green book", written and taught by people like "Gaius and Titius" is not only possible but has already begun to take shape in today's time. Hence much of Lewis's concept of education influencing morality is already underway. I agree with Lewis that education is the one part of nurturing and raising the next generation that we have full control over, and it's scary to see people use it to spread their own version of the truth, rather than the actual Truth. There are some things in the course of nature and nature itself that are universal truths that cannot be changed, yet the misuse of education as a means to spread opinions as facts is prevalent in today's world. "Tao" as I believe Lewis describes it, is the world of Rationality and Reason that has always existed. We humans have been given the gift of understanding "Tao" but only if we work to understand it by using it. "One cannot criticize the Tao from the outside" as Lewis puts it. We have always understood the "Tao"; from the beginning of our species' existence. Our ancestors have taught us to process the "Tao", how to learn from it, how to grow in it. And if we see our progress as a species through that lens, we will see it in a more optimistic light than we do currently. Basically, we'd be happier.

I may not have read this book from my work, or my M.Ed. program, but just because I have always loved Lewis's Narnia and I wanted to know more of what he had to say to the adult audience. Yet, I now find Lewis's words becoming an essential part of my pedagogical creed and influencing how I educate my students. A beautiful book which I will probably read again and again until I've understood it all and memorized it word by word.

I wish I was half as smart as Lewis just so I could understand any of this

This has been my favorite Lewis read to date. I have had this on the shelf for a while and didn't think much of it, and even into the first essay was thinking the same thing. However by the time Lewis is really getting to the crux of the matter, and I adjusted to his prose, I was absolutely fascinated with his argument for universal values. I think this book resonates so strongly with me because while not overtly 'christian' (which is a breath of fresh air sometimes), the implication that our society is losing any objective values is one that affects all of us more than we may initially think.