I often share a maxim with young people I work with. It takes a couple of different forms: Only lazy people work hard, or lazy people end up working the hardest. I think it is a helpful proverb. I have for some time attributed the idea to C.S. Lewis, but I couldn’t remember where I picked it up. So, I began to search for exactly where I got this idea.
As it turns out, I actually got it from a Eugene Peterson book I had to read in seminary called The Contemplative Pastor. Peterson remarks that this (‘only lazy people work hard’) was a ‘favorite theme’ of C.S. Lewis. It may have been a favorite theme, but I am only aware of one place where he says it outright:
Teachers will tell you that the laziest boy in the class is the one who works hardest in the end. They mean this. If you give two boys, say, a proposition in geometry to do, the one who is prepared to take trouble will try to understand it. The lazy boy will try to learn it by heart because, for the moment, that needs less effort. But six months later, when they are preparing for an exam, that lazy boy is doing hours and hours of miserable drudgery over things the other boy understands, and positively enjoys, in a few minutes. Laziness means more work in the long run (Mere Christianity, chapter 30).
I’d like to know of other places in Lewis where he expresses the idea, so by all means, share it with me if you know of any.
I read this excerpt from Peterson, too. I questioned it since I’m a Lewis reader and don’t recall anything like this from CSL which would be strange for a “favorite theme.”
Thanks for the Mere Christianity reference.
One of my pet peeves is authors not footnoting when they reference something. Not making footnotes means more work for the reader in the long run. I’ve never found any other references.