The Question of Absolute Moral Law

A Review of Peter Kreeft's C.S. Lewis for the Third Millennium

This is a collection of six essays by Peter Kreeft that center especially on C. S. Lewis’s book Abolition of Man. Kreeft considers the book as prophetic in portraying mankind as lacking souls when they deny “natural moral law,” what Lewis called the “Tao.” The Tao is made of absolute morals understood by members of humanity, whatever culture they live in. Kreeft puts this assertion against that of Thomas Aquinas, who said that natural law can never be abolished from the heart of man. The author tends to agree with Lewis, and offers contemporary issues, like abortion, to this point, though he finds he cannot completely refute Aquinas. He also includes Walker Percy’s Lost in the Cosmos as a humorous treatment of Lewis’s point. But Lewis could also be optimistic, as demonstrated in the cosmic dance portrayed in his science fiction novel, Perelandra, in which joyful cosmology replaces the joyless. The proof of which argument is right can only be provided by mankind in the future. Kreeft wants to be optimistic, and so ends “Please be a saint.”

There is some repetition between this book and Kreeft’s Culture War. This book is more of the academic work; the other is more conversational in tone, but also the tone of political rhetoric. This book is stronger on philosophy, lesser on contemporary applications.