Gardening Meditation: 4 Loves and Nature’s Glory

C.S. Lewis shares a profound glimpse of nature’s processes in relationship to one who gardens. In his book The Four Loves, Lewis gives a brief shout-out about the experience of tending a garden in parallel to the ways we experience (or often diminish our experience of) love. Where is the glory of a garden? It is tended. Not completely wild. The gardener uses tools and necessary negatives to hone the outcome of what actually grows.

For an excerpt from the book, scroll down to read Lewis’s words. Read the quote.

Intro to C.S. Lewis’s writings

Although the author is famous for many different styles of writing, my favorite books he has written are the purely fictional kind. However, this book is much more oriented towards deep philosophical thought. That’s not exactly light reading.

Lewis is most well-known for his Narnia Books and Christian Insights, but he has written many genres including Allegories, Mythological Retellings, Political Commentaries, and much more!

Note about The Four Loves

Although the Four Loves is quite weighty in addressing the way that Love has four different guises (or divergent types of expression). Lewis goes to great depths in displaying these heavy concepts he has outlined, using practical examples.

He throws in dashes of word-pictures and imaginative illustrations every once in a while to keep it relatable. I feel the theoretical tone of this book is a bit tedious to wade through at times; however worth it – it is – to land on the height of a new epiphany hidden within the pages.

So, here is my blog entry to place a digital bookmark for later pondering.

The Illustration of a Garden

In the book, it comes as a welcome reprieve on page 116 & 117 that he turns to a simple illustration of a garden. This is so refreshing in the midst of the chapter called “Charity”. Of course it is not a new idea to point to the parallels between nature and spirituality. However, Lewis does it with such a unique angle that I couldn’t resist writing about it here.

Where the Glory is Found

“…It is no disparagement to a garden to say that it will not fence and weed itself, nor prune its own fruit trees, nor roll and cut its own lawns. A garden is a good thing but that is not the sort of goodness it has. It will remain a garden, as distinct from a wilderness, only if someone does all these things to it. It’s real glory is of quite a different kind. The very fact that it needs constant weeding and pruning bears witness to that glory. It teems with life. It glows with colour and smells like heaven and puts forward at every hours of a summer day beauties which man could never have created and could not even, on his own resources, have imagined. If you want to see the difference between its contribution and the gardener’s put the commonest weed it grows side by side with his hoes, rakes, shears, and packet of weed killer; you have put beauty, energy and fecundity beside dead, sterile things. Just so, our “decency and common sense” show grey and deathlike beside the geniality of love. And when the garden is in its full glory the gardener’s contributions to that glory will still have been in a sense paltry compared with those of nature.

C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves – p.p. 116-117

The Earth Teems With Life

I think every time i read the above passage from this book, I land on a different thought. What amazing imagery of the importance of common sense. The simplicity of comparison here, is profound! Lewis contrasts the vibrant life found in plants with the sterile rake, shears, or lawnmower! The cruelty of killing some plants to allow a garden to be MORE fruitful.

When pondering the vast concept of *love* the argument for/against self-control is significant, to say the least. Although this book was written in 1960, it rings true today! The above words might ring true or hollow, depending on your personal answers to questions of morality.

But Wait, There’s More!

After the above quote on pages 116 & 117, Lewis’ focus shifts a bit. This time drawing comparisons between weather-patterns and grace. Check it out:

Grace Like Rain 🌧️

Without life springing from the earth, without rain, light and heat descending from the sky, he [person working as gardener] could do nothing. When he [the gardener] has done all, he has merely encouraged here and discouraged there, powers and beauties that have a different source. But his share, though small, is indispensable and laborious. When God planted a garden He set a man over it and set the man under Himself. When He planted the garden of our nature and caused the flowering, fruiting loves to grow there, He set our will to “dress” them. Compared with them it is dry and cold. And unless HIS GRACE COMES DOWN, LIKE THE RAIN AND THE SUNSHINE, WE SHALL USE THIS TOOL TO LITTLE PURPOSE. [Emphasis added]

C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves – p. 116

Wow.

Lewis continues on down the garden analogy path, beyond this: comparing / contrasting our current fallen state to the original garden of Eden, but I’ll save that for you, dear Reader, to explore when you read the book for yourself. (Find The Four Loves on Goodreads.)

Re-Reading the Book a Decade Later

The first time I read this book, I was in high school. It was just after I read Till We Have Faces by Lewis, and the two books could not be more opposite. (See Till We have Faces on Goodreads)

Now, about ten years later, (ok maybe more 🧐) re-reading this has been really interesting. At a completely different stage of life, this one hits different. What a glimpse of Grace. Temperance. The way Lewis combines metaphor and philosophy is brilliant.

I am so thankful for someone like Lewis who has the ability to convert abstract emotions into thought-provoking words!

Take it to the Garden!

I hope that the next time you walk outside and into a garden, you take with you a small idea to ponder along the way.

Maybe from this very blog post.

If you liked the thoughts shared here, feel free to check out more of my blog:

• Garden Meditations
• Literary references.

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