Too quick an intelligence, like the total lack of it, is generally held to be close to madness. Nothing is good but mediocrity. A majority vote has settled that, and the said majority will snap at anyone who detaches himself from the crowd, by whatever door he makes his escape. I make no difficulty about it and am perfectly content to sit in the middle; but I flatly refuse the lower end, not because it is low, but because it is "end"--and I would equally refuse if the end were at the top. If we leave the middle way, we part company with humanity. The greatness in the human mind lies in knowing how to hold to that middle way. It is no sign of greatness that a man should separate himself from humanity: it is a more convincing sign of greatness if he does not part company with it.
Pensee 191. of Blaise Pascal
The humblest of us, in a state of Grace, can have some "knowledge-by-acquaintance", some "tasting" of Love Himself; but man even at his highest sanctity and intelligence has no "direct knowledge" about the ultimate Being--only analogies. We cannot see light, though by light we can see things. Statements about God are extrapolations from the knowledge of other things which the divine illumination enables us to know.
CS Lewis in 'The Four Loves'
Hell is a state of mind... And every state of mind, left to itself, every shutting up of the creature within the dungeon of its own mind--is, in the end, Hell. But Heaven is not a state of mind. Heaven is reality itself. All that is fully real is Heavenly.
CS Lewis in 'The Great Divorce'
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