*<\/div>\n
[Joy, or\u00a0Sehnsucht<\/i>\u00a0is] a special kind of longing . . . surrounded by a misty indefiniteness which seems essential to its very nature . . . it encompasses not only . . . Germanic longing . . . but also the more turbulent, passionate aspiration associated with what [Matthew] Arnold calls \u201cCeltic Titanism\u201d . . . At times one sees it clearly, at other times it seems to recede before one\u2019s eyes . . . Thus, the exploring of this mystery has turned out to be a quest in itself. . . .<\/p>\n
For many writers it is simply there and they make no attempt to explain it. Some of them \u2013 especially poets like Wordsworth and Traherne \u2013 have expressed this attitude primarily as an ecstatic desire for union with nature; some have spoken of a \u201csweet melancholy\u201d which seems to have no cause. . . .<\/p>\n
In several places Lewis has referred to the state of mind under discussion as\u00a0Sehnsucht<\/i>\u00a0. . . the German word has overtones of nostalgia and longing not to be found in any English word . . . The crucial concept in defining this attitude is best expressed in English by the word \u201cnostalgia.\u201d Even though\u00a0Sehnsucht<\/i>\u00a0may be made up of several different components or appear in different forms (melancholy, wonder, yearning, etc.), basic to its various manifestations is an underlying sense of displacement or alienation from what is desired. . . .<\/p>\n
The wonder of spring . . . may bring feelings of ecstasy which cause the individual for the moment to transcend himself . . . Such moments are rare; they may come with a mounting sense of grandeur in the presence of natural beauty or with piercing sweetness on hearing a certain strain of music . . . an experience of \u201cenormous bliss,\u201d of being transported to awesome heights which make the close-by world seem far away. The individual feels that he is becoming one with the universe and desires an even closer union. We find this note frequently sounded by poets of the Romantic Revival \u2013 especially Wordsworth, Shelley, and Keats \u2013 and by the American Transcendentalists \u2013 notably Emerson and Whitman. . . .<\/p>\n
Not infrequently the locus of melancholy is fixed upon someone who is loved but does not return love, or on some ideal person who has died, or upon some golden time which is no more \u2013 the glory of Greece, the grandeur of Renaissance Italy, the mystic charm of the Middle Ages . . . the pursuit of the unattainable . . . The dreamer keeps on creating better worlds \u2013 in other places, among different people, etc. This motif is found in German literature as the search for the\u00a0Blaue Blume<\/i>\u00a0[the blue flower] . . . A sense of separation from what is desired, a ceaseless longing which always points beyond \u2013 this then is the essence of the attitude I have attempted to describe.<\/p>\n(Corbin Scott Carnell,\u00a0Bright Shadow of Reality: C. S. Lewis and the Feeling Intellect<\/i>, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1974, 13, 12, 13-15, 19-20-23)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
It was a sensation, of course, of desire; but desire for what? . . . Before I knew what I desired, the desire itself was gone, the whole glimpse withdrawn, the world turned commonplace again, or only stirred by a longing for the longing that had just ceased. It had taken only a moment of time; and in a certain sense everything else that had ever happened to me was insignificant in comparison. The second glimpse came through\u00a0Squirrel Nutkin<\/i>; through it only, though I loved all the Beatrix Potter books . . . it administered the shock, it was a trouble. It troubled me with what I can only describe as the\u00a0Idea of Autumn.<\/i>\u00a0It sounds fantastic to say that one can be enamored of a season, but that is something like what happened; and as before, the experience was one of intense desire. And one went back to the book, not to gratify the desire (that was impossible \u2013 how can one\u00a0possess\u00a0<\/i>Autumn?) but to reawake it. And in this experience also there was the same surprise and the same sense of incalculable importance. It was something quite different from ordinary life and even from ordinary pleasure; something, as they would now say, \u2018in another dimension\u2019 . . . [it was] an unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction. I call it\u00a0Joy\u00a0<\/i>. . . anyone who has experienced it will want it again . . . I doubt whether anyone who has tasted it would ever, if both were in his power, exchange it for all the pleasures in the world.<\/p>\n(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0Surprised by Joy,\u00a0<\/i>London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1955, 16-18)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
Joy is distinct not only from pleasure in general but even from aesthetic pleasure. It must have the stab, the pang, the inconsolable longing.<\/span><\/p>\n(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0Surprised by Joy,\u00a0<\/i>London: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1955, 72)<\/span><\/div>\n\u00a0*<\/div>\n
O we can wait no longer,
\nWe too take ship O soul
\nJoyous we too launch out on trackless seas.
\nFearless for unknown shores on waves of ecstasy to sail.<\/p>\n
(Walt Whitman,\u00a0Passage to India<\/i>)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
But often, in the world\u2019s most crowded streets,
\nBut often, in the din of strife,
\nThere rises an unspeakable desire
\nAfter the knowledge of our buried life;
\nA thirst to spend our fire and restless force
\nIn tracking out our true, original course;
\n\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026
\nAnd many a man in his own breast delves,
\nBut deep enough, alas! none ever mines.
\n\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026\u2026.
\nYet still, from time to time, vague and forlorn,
\nFrom soul\u2019s subterranean depth upborne
\nAs from an infinitely distant land,
\nCome airs, and floating echoes, and convey
\nA melancholy into all our day.<\/p>\n
(Matthew Arnold,\u00a0The Buried Life<\/i>)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
I have learned to look on nature . . . [as] a presence that disturbs me with the joy of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime of something far more deeply interfused, Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, And the round ocean, and the living air, and the blue sky, and in the mind of man: a motion and a spirit that impels all thinking things, all objects of all thought, and rolls through all things. Therefore am I still a lover of the meadows and the woods and mountains; and of all that we behold from this green earth . . . well pleased to recognize in nature and the language of the sense the anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, the guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul, of all my moral being.<\/p>\n
(William Wordswoth,\u00a0Tintern Abbey<\/i>, 1798)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
All joy (as distinct from mere pleasure, still more amusement) emphasises our pilgrim status; always reminds, beckons, awakens desire. Our best havings are wantings.<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0Letters<\/i>, 5 November 1959)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
In speaking of this desire for our own far-off country, . . . I feel a certain shyness. I am almost committing an indecency. I am trying to rip open the inconsolable secret in each one of you \u2013 the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by calling it names like Nostalgia and Romanticism and Adolescence; the secret also which pierces with such sweetness that when, in very intimate conversation, the mention of it becomes imminent, we grow awkward and affect to laugh at ourselves; the secret we cannot hide and cannot tell, though we desire to do both . . . Our commonest expedient is to call it beauty and behave as if that had settled the matter. Wordsworth\u2019s expedient was to identify it with certain moments in his own past. But all this is a cheat. If Wordsworth had gone back to those moments in the past, he would not have found the thing itself, but only the reminder of it; what he remembered would turn out to be itself a remembering. The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not\u00a0in<\/i>\u00a0them, it only came\u00a0through<\/i>\u00a0them, and what came through them was longing. These things \u2013 the beauty, the memory of our own past \u2013 are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers. For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited . . . . Here, then, is the desire, still wandering and uncertain of its object and still largely unable to see that object in the direction where it really lies . . . Heaven is, by definition, outside our experience, but all intelligible descriptions must be of things within our experience. The scriptural picture of heaven is therefore just as symbolical as the picture which our desire, unaided, invents for itself . . .<\/p>\n(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0The Weight of Glory<\/i>, a sermon preached at Oxford, June 8, 1941)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
He groped for the doorless land of faery, that illimitable haunted country that opened somewhere below a leaf or a stone.<\/p>\n
(Thomas Wolfe,\u00a0Look Homeward Angel<\/i>)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
The experience is one of intense longing . . . This hunger is better than any other fullness; this poverty better than all other wealth. And thus it comes about, that if the desire is long absent, it may itself be desired, and that new desiring becomes a new instance of the original desire . . . The human soul was made to enjoy some object that is never fully given \u2013 nay, cannot even be imagined as given \u2013 in our present mode of subjective and spatio-temporal experience.<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0The Pilgrim\u2019s Regress<\/i>, Preface, para. 12-13, 17)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
. . . fits of strange Desire, which haunt him from his earliest years, for something which cannot be named; something which he can describe only as \u201cNot this,\u201d \u201cFar farther,\u201d or \u201cYonder.\u201d<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0The Pilgrim\u2019s Regress<\/i>, London: Sheed & Ward, 1933, 11)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
What is universal is . . . the arrival of some message, not perfectly intelligible, which wakes this desire and sets men longing for something East or West of the world; something possessed, if at all, only in the act of desiring it, and lost so quickly that the craving itself becomes craved.<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0The Pilgrim\u2019s Regress<\/i>, bk. 8, ch. 9)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
Northernness had a quality of aesthetic exaltation about it which Lewis had not found in Christianity and which he was seeking in the occult. Where religion had failed, Wagner and Norse mythology were able to awaken that strange excitement which at times he had experienced in his childhood.<\/p>\n
(Carnell, ibid<\/em>., 42)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
The Celtic origin seems never to have affected my imagination which is Germanic through and through \u2013 Norse mythology having been my first love and perhaps my strongest.<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis, in Chad Walsh,\u00a0C.S. Lewis: Apostle to the Skeptics<\/i>, New York: Macmillan, 1949, 2-3)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
From at least the age of six, romantic longing \u2013\u00a0Sehnsucht<\/i>\u00a0\u2013 had played an unusually central part in my experience. Such longing is in itself the very reverse of wishful thinking: it is more like thoughtful wishing.<\/p>\n(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0Narrative Poems<\/i>, Preface to\u00a0Dymer<\/i>\u00a0[1950], para. 5)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
[the quality found in George Macdonald\u2019s\u00a0Phantastes<\/i>\u00a0was] the quality of the real universe, the divine, magical, terrifying and ecstatic reality in which we all live . . . what I learned to love in\u00a0Phantastes<\/i>\u00a0was goodness . . . The deception is all the other way round \u2013 in that prosaic moralism which confines goodness to the region of Law and Duty, which never lets us feel in our face the sweet air blowing from \u201cthe land of righteousness.\u201d<\/p>\n(C. S. Lewis, preface to\u00a0George Macdonald: An Anthology<\/i>, New York: Macmillan, 1948, 21-22)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
Lewis\u2019s Platonism is unmistakable . . . Lewis found in Platonism a comprehensive way to reconcile reason\u2019s dialectic with the reasons of the heart. To settle for anything less than such a reconciliation, he felt, would be to betray his experience of art, mind, and the everyday world.<\/p>\n
(Carnell, ibid<\/em>., 67)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
Perhaps it has sometimes happened to you in a dream that someone says something which you don\u2019t understand but in the dream it feels as if it had some enormous meaning . . . a lovely meaning too lovely to put into words, which makes the dream so beautiful that you remember it all your life and are always wishing you could get into that dream again.<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe<\/i>, ch. 7)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
You may have noticed that the books you really love are bound together by a secret thread. You know very well what is the common quality that makes you love them, though you cannot put it into words . . . Even in your hobbies, has there not always been some secret attraction . . . \u2013 something, not to be identified with, but always on the verge of breaking through, the smell of cut wood in the workshop or the clap-clap of water against the boat\u2019s side? Are not all lifelong friendships born at the moment when at last you meet another human being who has some inkling (but faint and uncertain even in the best) of that something which you were born desiring, and which, beneath the flux of other desires . . . you are looking for, watching for, listening for?<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0The Problem of Pain<\/i>, New York: Macmillan, 1938, 145-146)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
Although we associate fairy tales with children,\u00a0faerie\u00a0<\/i>is probably the most complex conveyor of the\u00a0Sehnsucht<\/i>\u00a0archetype. And compared to . . . quests, distant hills, exotic gardens, the Utter East, music of a special kind \u2013 the world of faerie is perhaps the most potent awakener of longing. Lewis says it stirs and troubles the child, to his advantage, \u201cwith the dim sense of something beyond his reach and far from dulling or emptying the actual world, gives it a new dimension of depth\u201d (Of Other Worlds<\/i>\u00a0[New York: Harcourt Brace, 1966], p. 29). . . .<\/p>\n
Lewis believes . . . that in its imaginative appeal the myth conveys meaning that cannot be conveyed in any other way . . . Myth appears to have its own inner life, secret from our conscious minds.<\/p>\n
(Carnell, ibid<\/em>., 91, 108-109)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
About the best poetry, and not only the best, there floats an atmosphere of infinite suggestion. The poet speaks to us of one thing, but in this one thing there seems to lurk the secret of all. He said what he meant, but his meaning seems to beckon away beyond itself, or rather into something boundless which is only focused in it; something also which, we feel, would satisfy not only the imagination, but the whole of us.<\/p>\n
*<\/div>\n
(A. C. Bradley,\u00a0Oxford Lectures on Poetry<\/i>, London: Macmillan, 1909, 26)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
Great art is the arrangement of the environment so as to provide for the soul vivid, but transient values . . . something new must be discovered . . . the permanent realization of values extending beyond its former self.<\/p>\n
(Alfred North Whitehead,\u00a0Science and the Modern World<\/i>, New York: Macmillan, 1926, 290-291)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
You have stood before some landscape, which seems to embody what you have been looking for all your life; and then turned to the friend at your side who appears to be seeing what you saw \u2013 but at the first words a gulf yawns between you, and you realise that this landscape means something totally different to him, that he is pursuing an alien vision and cares nothing for the ineffable suggestion by which you are transported . . . All the things that have deeply possessed your soul have been but hints of it \u2013 tantalising glimpses, promises never quite fulfilled, echoes that died away just as they caught your ear. But if it should really become manifest \u2013 if there ever came an echo that did not die away but swelled into the sound itself \u2013 you would know it. Beyond all possibility of doubt you would say \u2018Here at last is the thing I was made for.\u2019 We cannot tell each other about it. It is the secret signature of each soul, the incommunicable and unappeasable want . . . which we shall still desire on our deathbeds . . . Your place in heaven will seem to be made for you and you alone, because you were made for it \u2013 made for it stitch by stitch as a glove is made for a hand.<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0The Problem of Pain,\u00a0<\/i>New York: Macmillan, 1938, 145-148)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
Lewis retained his faith in the basic validity of Romantic literature because he believed it was compatible with a Christian ontology. The sense of nostalgia cannot be valued for itself, at least not for long.\u00a0Sehnsucht<\/i>\u00a0has genuine meaning only in an ontology which has a place for it. . . .<\/p>\n
That we have appetites suggests we will find food. That we get drowsy suggests that sleep exists. That we respond to melody suggests that men will devise music. That we are haunted by unquenchable longings points to a goal for that longing \u2013 in eternity if not in time. I find in C.S. Lewis\u2019 understanding of\u00a0Sehnsucht<\/i>\u00a0a parallel to Anselm\u2019s ontological argument, Lewis\u2019 most significant contribution to Christian apologetics, and an important clue for understanding literary history.<\/p>\n(Carnell, ibid<\/em>., 158-159, 163)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world.<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0Mere Christianity<\/i>, bk. 3, ch. 10)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
We do not want merely to see beauty . . . We want something else which can hardly be put into words \u2013 to be united with the beauty we see, to pass into it, to receive it into ourselves, to bathe in it, to become part of it. That is why we have peopled air and earth and water with gods and goddesses, and nymphs and elves.<\/p>\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0Transposition and Other Addresses<\/i>, 1949)<\/span><\/div>\n*<\/div>\n
. . . quivering and ecstatic aspirations which absorbed his whole being, infinite yearnings, stabbed with the threat of tragedy and shot through with the colours of Paradise. One of our race, if plunged back for a moment in the warm, trembling, iridescent pool of that pre-Adamite consciousness, would have emerged believing that he had grasped the absolute: for the states below reason and the states above it have, by their common contrast to the life we know, a certain superficial resemblance. Sometimes there returns to us from infancy the memory of a nameless delight or terror, unattached to any delightful or dreadful thing, a potent adjective floating in a nounless void, a pure quality. At such moments we have experience of the shallows of that pool.<\/p>\n
\n
(C. S. Lewis,\u00a0That Hideous Strength<\/i>)<\/span><\/p>\n*****<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Sehnsucht (Tr\u00e4umerei [dreaming]) (c. 1900), by Heinrich Vogeler (1872-1942) [public domain \/ Wikimedia Commmons] *** [compiled and edited by Dave Armstrong; uploaded on 11-13-01] ***** [Joy, or\u00a0Sehnsucht\u00a0is a] . . . wistful, soft tearful longing. (Matthew Arnold,\u00a0On the Study of Celtic Literature, New York: Macmillan, 1907, 117-118) * [Joy, or\u00a0Sehnsucht\u00a0is] a special kind of longing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2331,"featured_media":12797,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[725],"tags":[4170,4169,2363,739,1460,3088,3089,2367,738,3094,1644,333,737,3093,3092,734,1643,3091,3090,731],"class_list":["post-12796","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-romantic-imaginative-theology","tag-argument-from-desire","tag-argument-from-longing","tag-c-s-lewis","tag-charles-williams","tag-fairy-tales","tag-fantasy","tag-folklore","tag-g-k-chesterton","tag-george-macdonald","tag-harry-potter","tag-imagination","tag-inklings","tag-j-r-r-tolkien","tag-joy","tag-longing","tag-longing-for-heaven","tag-mythology","tag-myths-and-truth","tag-romanticism","tag-sehnsucht"],"yoast_head":"\n
On Sehnsucht & Longing (C. S. Lewis & the Romantics)<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Collection of quotations on the topic of "sehnsucht": the intense, bittersweet longing for what always seems to be out of our grasp (God, heaven?)\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"On Sehnsucht & Longing (C. S. Lewis & the Romantics)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Collection of quotations on the topic of "sehnsucht": the intense, bittersweet longing for what always seems to be out of our grasp (God, heaven?)\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2017-08-04T17:02:45+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-08-04T17:09:32+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/572\/2017\/08\/Sehnsucht.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"624\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"768\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Dave Armstrong\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Dave Armstrong\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"15 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html\",\"name\":\"On Sehnsucht & Longing (C. S. Lewis & the Romantics)\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2017-08-04T17:02:45+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-08-04T17:09:32+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#\/schema\/person\/471eaa20e441eca4bb1ea50393cf632e\"},\"description\":\"Collection of quotations on the topic of \\\"sehnsucht\\\": the intense, bittersweet longing for what always seems to be out of our grasp (God, heaven?)\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"On Sehnsucht & Longing (C. S. Lewis & the Romantics)\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/\",\"name\":\"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism\",\"description\":\"Catholic biblical apologetics\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#\/schema\/person\/471eaa20e441eca4bb1ea50393cf632e\",\"name\":\"Dave Armstrong\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/820e6db89734ae7a9e5dac8d498f5ac7?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/820e6db89734ae7a9e5dac8d498f5ac7?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Dave Armstrong\"},\"description\":\"Dave Armstrong is a Catholic author and apologist, who has been actively proclaiming and defending Christianity since 1981, and Catholicism in particular since 1991 (full-time since December 2001). Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \\\"This Rock\\\" (now called \\\"Catholic Answers Magazine\\\"), \\\"Envoy Magazine\\\" (Patrick Madrid), \\\"The Catholic Answer,\\\" \\\"The Coming Home Journal,\\\" \\\"Gilbert Magazine\\\" (American Chesterton Society), and \\\"The Latin Mass.\\\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \\\"The Michigan Catholic\\\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \\\"Envoy Magazine.\\\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \\\"Catholic Answers Live\\\" (twice), \\\"Faith and Family Live\\\" (Steve Wood), \\\"Kresta in the Afternoon,\\\" \\\"Son Rise Morning Show,\\\" \\\"Catholic Connection\\\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \\\"The Catholics Next Door.\\\" His large and popular website, \\\"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\\\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \\\"Envoy Magazine.\\\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \\\"index\\\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \\\"Surprised by Truth\\\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \\\"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\\\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \\\"The Catholic Verses\\\" (2004), \\\"The One-Minute Apologist\\\" (2007), \\\"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\\\" (2009), \\\"The Quotable Newman\\\" (editor: 2012), and \\\"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\\\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \\\"The New Catholic Answer Bible\\\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \\\"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\\\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \\\"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\\\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \\\"Quotable Wesley\\\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. They have three sons and a daughter, and reside in southeast Michigan (metro Detroit).\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/\",\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@LuxVeritatisApologetics\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/author\/davearmstrong\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"On Sehnsucht & Longing (C. S. Lewis & the Romantics)","description":"Collection of quotations on the topic of \"sehnsucht\": the intense, bittersweet longing for what always seems to be out of our grasp (God, heaven?)","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"On Sehnsucht & Longing (C. S. Lewis & the Romantics)","og_description":"Collection of quotations on the topic of \"sehnsucht\": the intense, bittersweet longing for what always seems to be out of our grasp (God, heaven?)","og_url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html","og_site_name":"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798","article_published_time":"2017-08-04T17:02:45+00:00","article_modified_time":"2017-08-04T17:09:32+00:00","og_image":[{"width":624,"height":768,"url":"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/572\/2017\/08\/Sehnsucht.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Dave Armstrong","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Dave Armstrong","Est. reading time":"15 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html","name":"On Sehnsucht & Longing (C. S. Lewis & the Romantics)","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#website"},"datePublished":"2017-08-04T17:02:45+00:00","dateModified":"2017-08-04T17:09:32+00:00","author":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#\/schema\/person\/471eaa20e441eca4bb1ea50393cf632e"},"description":"Collection of quotations on the topic of \"sehnsucht\": the intense, bittersweet longing for what always seems to be out of our grasp (God, heaven?)","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html"]}]},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/2017\/08\/c-s-lewis-romantics-sehnsucht-longing.html#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"On Sehnsucht & Longing (C. S. Lewis & the Romantics)"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/","name":"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism","description":"Catholic biblical apologetics","potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#\/schema\/person\/471eaa20e441eca4bb1ea50393cf632e","name":"Dave Armstrong","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/820e6db89734ae7a9e5dac8d498f5ac7?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/820e6db89734ae7a9e5dac8d498f5ac7?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Dave Armstrong"},"description":"Dave Armstrong is a Catholic author and apologist, who has been actively proclaiming and defending Christianity since 1981, and Catholicism in particular since 1991 (full-time since December 2001). Formerly a campus missionary, as a Protestant, Dave was received into the Catholic Church in February 1991, by the late, well-known catechist and theologian, Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave\u2019s articles have appeared in many influential Catholic periodicals, including \"This Rock\" (now called \"Catholic Answers Magazine\"), \"Envoy Magazine\" (Patrick Madrid), \"The Catholic Answer,\" \"The Coming Home Journal,\" \"Gilbert Magazine\" (American Chesterton Society), and \"The Latin Mass.\" He also writes a featured column for every issue of \"The Michigan Catholic\": published by the archdiocese of Detroit, and was editor for most of the apologetics tracts published by the St. Paul Street Evangelization apostolate. Dave\u2019s apologetics and writing apostolate was the subject of a feature article in the May 2002 issue of \"Envoy Magazine.\" He served as the staff moderator at the Internet discussion forum for The Coming Home Network, from 2007-2010. Dave has been interviewed on many nationally syndicated Catholic radio shows, including \"Catholic Answers Live\" (twice), \"Faith and Family Live\" (Steve Wood), \"Kresta in the Afternoon,\" \"Son Rise Morning Show,\" \"Catholic Connection\" (Teresa Tomeo), and \"The Catholics Next Door.\" His large and popular website, \"Biblical Evidence for Catholicism,\" was online from March 1997 to March 2007, and received the 1998 Catholic Website of the Year award from \"Envoy Magazine.\" His blog of the same name (now transferred to Patheos), begun in February 2004, contains more than 1,500 papers, at least 500 debates or dialogues, and over 50 distinct \"index\" web pages. Unsolicited correspondence has indicated many hundreds of conversions (or returns) to the Catholic faith as a result, by God's grace, of these writings. Dave's conversion story was published in the bestselling book \"Surprised by Truth\" (edited by Patrick Madrid; San Diego: Basilica Press, 1994). Sophia Institute Press has published six of his books: \"A Biblical Defense of Catholicism\" (Foreword by Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J., 1996 \/ 2003), \"The Catholic Verses\" (2004), \"The One-Minute Apologist\" (2007), \"Bible Proofs for Catholic Truths\" (2009), \"The Quotable Newman\" (editor: 2012), and \"Proving the Catholic Faith is Biblical\" (2015). He is co-author (with Dr. Paul Thigpen) of the inserts for \"The New Catholic Answer Bible\" (Our Sunday Visitor: 2005), and editor for \"The Wisdom of Mr. Chesterton: The Very Best Quotes, Quips, and Cracks from the Pen of G. K. Chesterton\" (Saint Benedict Press \/ TAN Books: 2009). \"100 Biblical Arguments Against Sola Scriptura\" was published by Catholic Answers in May 2012. His \"Quotable Wesley\" compilation was published by (Protestant \/ Wesleyan publisher) Beacon Hill Press in April 2014. Several of his 49 books are bestsellers in their field. Dave maintains a popular personal Facebook page, a Facebook author page, and has a Twitter account as well. He offers almost all of his books in e-book form on his own Biblical Catholicism site (http:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/), at a permanent deep discount: only $2.99 for ePub, mobi, and AZW, and $1.99 for PDF. His writing has been enthusiastically endorsed or recommended by many leading Catholic apologists, authors, and priests, including Dr. Scott Hahn, Fr. Peter M. J. Stravinskas, Marcus Grodi, Patrick Madrid, Steve Ray, Tim Staples, Devin Rose, Mike Aquilina, Al Kresta, Karl Keating, Fr. Dwight Longenecker, Brandon Vogt, Marcellino D'Ambrosio, and Fr. John A. Hardon, S. J. Dave has been happily married to his wife Judy since October 1984. They have three sons and a daughter, and reside in southeast Michigan (metro Detroit).","sameAs":["https:\/\/biblicalcatholicism.com\/","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/dave.armstrong.798","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@LuxVeritatisApologetics"],"url":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/author\/davearmstrong"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12796","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2331"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12796"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12796\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12797"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12796"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12796"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/davearmstrong\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12796"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Sehnsucht\"](\"https:\/\/wp-media.patheos.com\/blogs\/sites\/572\/2017\/08\/Sehnsucht.jpg\")
<\/p>\n