Our society’s moral collapse and the wholesale failure of our educational system are related events – and they were forecast with chilling accuracy by C.S. Lewis in The Abolition of Man fifty years ago.

Dividing his book into three essays, “Men without Chests,” “The Way,” and “The Abolition of Man,” Lewis uses his delightful humor and his keen understanding of the human mind to challenge our notions about how to best teach our children – and ourselves – not merely reading and writing, but also a sense of morality. Lewis indicts modern educators for systematically debunking moral values while trying to foster intellectual development. “We make men without chests,” he says, “and expect of them virtue and enterprise. We laugh at honor and are shocked to find traitors in our midst. We castrate and bid the geldings be fruitful.” Along with its critique of contemporary education, this book provides a sure set of guidelines to a better approach, drawn from the spiritual tradition of the human race

There exists a Natural law, says Lewis, a universal set of objective moral standards, applicable to all men in all times. Stepping outside this law, modern man has stepped into a void. Seeking the conquest of Nature, he has achieved instead the abolition of Man. The way to undo this disaster is to reconnect with the Natural law as the basis for all education, and indeed for our entire lives.

C.S. Lewis, Abolition of Man, (New York, Harper Collins, 1974) Abolition of Man