The Pilgrim’s Regress - C. S. Lewis

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the trap and turned to bid good-bye to Mr Enlightenment. Then a sudden thought came into his head, and he said:

      ‘I am not sure that I have really understood all your arguments, sir. Is it absolutely certain that there is no Landlord?’

      ‘Absolutely. I give you my word of honour.’

      With these words they shook hands. Mr Enlightenment turned the pony’s head up the by-road, gave it a touch with the whip, and in a few moments was out of sight.

       THE HILL

      John abandons his religion with profound relief – And forthwith has his first explicitly moral experience

      Then I saw John bounding forward on his road so lightly that before he knew it he had come to the top of a little hill. It was not because the hill had tired him that he stopped there, but because he was too happy to move. ‘There is no Landlord,’ he cried. Such a weight had been lifted from his mind that he felt he could fly. All round him the frost was gleaming like silver; the sky was like blue glass; a robin sat in the hedge beside him; a cock was crowing in the distance. ‘There is no Landlord.’ He laughed when he thought of the old card of rules hung over his bed in the bedroom, so low and dark, in his father’s house. ‘There is no Landlord. There is no black hole.’ He turned and looked back on the road he had come by: and when he did so he gasped with joy. For there in the East, under the morning light, he saw the mountains heaped up to the sky like clouds, green and violet and dark red; shadows were passing over the big rounded slopes, and water shone in the mountain pools, and up at the highest of all the sun was smiling steadily on the ultimate crags. These crags were indeed so shaped that you could easily take them for a castle: and now it came into John’s head that he had never looked at the mountains before, because as long as he thought that the Landlord lived there, he had been afraid of them. But now that there was no Landlord he perceived that they were beautiful. For a moment he almost doubted whether the Island could be more beautiful, and whether he would not be wiser to go East, instead of West. But it did not seem to him to matter, for he said, ‘If the world has the mountains at one end and the Island at the other, then every road leads to beauty, and the world is a glory among glories.’

      At that moment he saw a man walking up the hill to meet him. Now I knew in my dream that this man’s name was Mr Vertue, and he was about of an age with John, or a little older.

      ‘What is the name of this place?’ said John.

      ‘It is called Jehovah-Jirah,’ said Mr Vertue.

      Then they both turned and continued their journey to the West. After they had gone a little way Mr Vertue stole a glance at John’s face and then he smiled a little.

      ‘Why do you smile?’ said John.

      ‘I was thinking that you looked very glad.’

      ‘So would you be if you had lived in the fear of a Landlord all your life and had just discovered that you were a free man.’

      ‘Oh, it’s that, is it?’

      ‘You don’t believe in the Landlord, do you?’

      ‘I know nothing about him – except by hearsay like the rest of us.’

      ‘You wouldn’t like to be under his thumb.’

      ‘Wouldn’t like? I wouldn’t be under anyone’s thumb.’

      ‘You might have to, if he had a black hole.’

      ‘I’d let him put me in the black hole sooner than take orders if the orders were not to my mind.’

      ‘Why, I think you are right. I can hardly believe it yet – that I need not obey the rules. There’s that robin again. To think that I could have a shot at it if I liked and no one would interfere with me!’

      ‘Do you want to?’

      ‘I’m not sure that I do,’ said John, fingering his sling. But when he looked round on the sunshine and remembered his great happiness and looked twice at the bird, he said, ‘No, I don’t. There is nothing I want less. Still – I could if I liked.’

      ‘You mean you could if you chose.’

      ‘Where’s the difference?’

      ‘All the difference in the world.’

       A LITTLE SOUTHWARD

      The Moral Imperative does not fully understand itself – John decides that Aesthetic Experience is the thing to pursue

      I thought that John would have questioned him further, but now they came in sight of a woman who was walking slower than they so that presently they came up with her and wished her good-day. When she turned, they saw that she was young and comely, though a little dark of complexion. She was friendly and frank, but not wanton like the brown girls, and the whole world became pleasanter to the young men because they were travelling the same way with her. But first they told her their names, and she told them hers, which was Media Halfways.

      ‘And where are you travelling to, Mr Vertue?’ she asked.

      ‘To travel hopefully is better than to arrive,’ said Vertue.

      ‘Do you mean you are just out for a walk, just for exercise?’

      ‘Certainly not,’ said Vertue, who was becoming a little confused. ‘I am on a pilgrimage. I must admit, now that you press me, I have not a very clear idea of the end. But that is not the important question. These speculations don’t make one a better walker. The great thing is to do one’s thirty miles a day.’

      ‘Why?’

      ‘Because that is the rule.’

      ‘Ho-ho!’ said John. ‘So you do believe in the Landlord after all.’

      ‘Not at all. I didn’t say it was the Landlord’s rule.’

      ‘Whose is it then?’

      ‘It is my own rule. I made it myself.’

      ‘But why?’

      ‘Well, that again is a speculative question. I have made the best rules I can. If I find any better ones I shall adopt them. In the meantime, the great thing is to have rules of some sort and to keep them.’

      ‘And where are you going?’ said Media, turning to John.

      Then John began to tell his companions about the Island, and how he had first seen it, and was determined to give up everything for the hope of finding it.

      ‘Then you had better come and see my father,’ said she. ‘He lives in the city of Thrill, and at the bottom of this hill there is a turn to the left which will bring us there in half an hour.’

      ‘Has your Father been to the Island? Does he know the way?’

      ‘He often talks about something very like it.’

      ‘You had better come with us, Vertue,’ said John, ‘since you do not know where you are going and there can be no place better to go than the Island.’

      ‘Certainly not,’ said Vertue. ‘We must keep to the road. We must keep on.’

      ‘I don’t see why,’ said John.

      ‘I dare say you don’t,’ said Vertue.

      All this time they were going down the hill, and now they came to a little grassy lane on the left which went off through a wood. Then I thought that John had a little hesitation: but partly because the sun was now hot

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