What is the title of C.S. Lewis’s 1943 book arguing that humanity must pursue objective moral values?

The C.S. Lewis book published in 1943 that argues for objective moral values is The Abolition of Man.

The Abolition of Man developed from three lectures Lewis delivered at the University of Durham in 1943. The book responds to educational ideas that, in Lewis’s view, treated moral judgments as merely subjective emotional reactions. He argues that education should cultivate genuine moral perception rather than simply produce efficient people.

Lewis presents what he calls the Tao, a term he uses for a broad tradition of basic moral principles found across cultures. His examples draw on Chinese, Hindu, Jewish, Christian, Greek, Roman, and other traditions. The argument is philosophical rather than a simple summary of Christian doctrine.

The title refers to Lewis’s warning that attempts to master nature through technological power could ultimately reduce human beings to products of manipulation. Readers sometimes confuse this book with The Problem of Pain, also published in 1940, but the two works address different central questions.