Fatherly Wisdom-No Favors, Please

This quote from C. S. Lewis (1898 – 1963) would teach us to say, "No favors, please," to our "compassionate" government that now tries to race in and bail out various institutions and even our whole economy. By the way, I'm still waiting for the "all-compassionate ones" in Washington D.C. and the state capitol to do the decent thing and return my money that they've taken in the form of various taxes (income taxes, sales taxes, cell phone fees, etc.). But don't worry, I'm not holding my breath. You see, our "compassionate" government now figures that letting us determine what to do with our money--pay off bills, save it, invest it, etc.--would not fit with their plans for our money.

As the Kairos Journal website says, "C. S. Lewis, literature professor and Christian apologist, peered behind the 'compassionate' actions of government and discovered instead threads of tyranny. He notes that the most benevolent ideas imposed on others through the rule of law can often result in the exact opposite of what is intended."

Here's the quote from C. S. Lewis:

Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. (C. S. Lewis, God in the Dock, ed. Walter Hooper [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1970], 292.)