C.S. Lewis:
As long as one is a Naturalist, “Nature” is only a word for “everything”—And Everything is not a subject about which anything very interesting can be said or (save by illusion) felt. . . .
But everything becomes different when we recognize that Nature is a creature, a created thing, with its own particular tang or flavour. . . .
The Englishness of English is audible only to those who know some other language well. In the same way and for the same reason, only Supernaturalists really see Nature. You must go a little away from her, and then turn round, and look back. Then at last the true landscape will become visible. You must have tasted, however briefly, the pure water from beyond the world before you can be distinctly conscious of the hot, salty tang of Nature’s current.
—C.S. Lewis, Miracles (reprint: New York, HarperOne, 2001), pp. 102, 104.
