George MacDonald (10 December 1824 – 18 September 1905) was a Scottish author, poet and Congregational minister. He became a pioneering figure in the field of modern fantasy literature and the mentor of fellow-writer Lewis Carroll. In addition to his fairy tales, MacDonald wrote several works of Christian theology, including several collections of sermons.
“Macdonald removes from our thinking every vestige of the image of God as a tyrant who is pleased with nothing less than the humanly impossible, and then who condemns man for not achieving it.” —Rolland Hein.
George MacDonald began his adult life as a clergyman and always considered himself a poet first of all. His unorthodox views resulted in a very short career in the pulpit, after which he turned to writing in earnest. He initially attracted notice for poetry and his adult fantasy, Phantastes, but once he turned to the writing of realistic novels in the early 1860s, his name became widely known throughout Great Britain and the U.S. Over the next thirty years he wrote some fifty books, including, in addition to the novels, more poetry, short stories, fantasy, sermons, essays, and a full-length study of Hamlet. His influential body of work placed him alongside the great Victorian men of letters and his following was vast.
MacDonald died in 1905 and his reputation gradually declined in the 20th century. Most of his books eventually went out of print as his name drifted from memory. A brief flurry of interest in his work was generated in 1924 at the centenary of his birth, resulting in several new editions of certain titles and the first major biography of his life, George MacDonald and His Wife, by his son Greville MacDonald
Obscure though his name gradually became, however, MacDonald was read and revered by an impressive gallery of well-known figures, both in his own time and in the years since. A few of these include G. K. Chesterton (who called him “one of the three or four greatest men of the 19th century”), W. H. Auden (who said that MacDonald was “one of the most remarkable writers of the 19th century”), Oswald Chambers (“How I love that man!”), and most notably C. S. Lewis. In spite of such a following, however, MacDonald’s reputation gradually declined throughout the 20th century.
Lewis acknowledged his spiritual debt to MacDonald as so great that he published an entire anthology of quotations by MacDonald in hopes of turning the public toward his spiritual mentor in large numbers. In the Introduction to that volume Lewis wrote: “I dare not say that he is never in error; but to speak plainly I know hardly any other writer who seems to be closer, or more continually close, to the Spirit of Christ Himself.I have never concealed the fact that I regarded him as my master; indeed I fancy I have never written a book in which I did not quote from him.”
Lewis’s efforts, however, were but modestly successful, and for the most part only in literary circles. Notwithstanding Lewis’s laudatory words, MacDonald’s name continued to fall out of the public consciousness. Even C.S. Lewis was not able to spark widespread interest in the man he called his master. By the 1960s nearly all his work, except for a few stories and fairy tales, was out of print, though his inclusion, along with Lewis and his “inkling” friends, in the newly established Marion Wade Center at Wheaton College in Illinois promised that he would never be forgotten.
A resurgence of interest in this forgotten Victorian, primarily in the United States, began to mount in the 1970s and 1980s, given initial impetus by the work of Wheaton professor Dr. Rolland Hein, and then exploding into public view from the efforts of MacDonald redactor and biographer Michael Phillips. Phillips’ work resulted in new generations of readers discovering anew the treasures in MacDonald’s work, and led to a renewed publication of MacDonald’s books on an unprecedented scale not seen since his own lifetime.
Taken from macdonaldphillips.com. The website of Michael Phillips and George MacDonald.
Additional quotes from the wisdom of George MacDonald compiled by Michael Phillips
Writings of George MacDonald:
Fantasy:
- Phantastes: A Fairie Romance for Men and Women (1858)
- Cross Purposes (1862)
- Adela Cathcart (1864), containing “The Light Princess”, “The Shadows”, and other short stories.
- The Portent: A Story of the Inner Vision of the Highlanders, Commonly Called “The Second Sight” (1864)
- Dealings with the Fairies (1867), containing “The Golden Key”, “The Light Princess”, “The Shadows”, and other short stories
- At the Back of the North Wind (1871)
- Works of Fancy and Imagination (1871), including Within and Without, “Cross Purposes”, “The Light Princess”, “The Golden Key”, and other works
- The Princess and the Goblin (1872)
- The Wise Woman: A Parable (1875)
- The Gifts of the Child Christ and Other Tales (1882; republished as “Stephen Archer” and Other Tales)
- The Day Boy and the Night Girl (1882)
- The Princess and Curdie (1883), a sequel to The Princess and the Goblin
- The Flight of the Shadow (1891)
- Lilith: A Romance (1895)
Realistic fiction:
- David Elginbrod (1863; republished as The Tutor’s First Love), originally published in three volumes
- Alec Forbes of Howglen (1865; republished as The Maiden’s Bequest)
- Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood (1867)
- Guild Court: A London Story (1868)
- Robert Falconer (1868; republished as The Musician’s Quest)
- The Seaboard Parish (1869), a sequel to Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood
- Ranald Bannerman’s Boyhood (1871)
- Wilfrid Cumbermede (1871–72)
- The Vicar’s Daughter (1871–72), a sequel to Annals of a Quiet Neighborhood and The Seaboard Parish
- The History of Gutta Percha Willie, the Working Genius (1873), usually called simply Gutta Percha Willie
- Malcolm (1875)
- St. George and St. Michael (1876)
- Thomas Wingfold, Curate (1876; republished as The Curate’s Awakening)
- The Marquis of Lossie (1877; republished as The Marquis’ Secret), the second book of Malcolm
- Paul Faber, Surgeon (1879; republished as The Lady’s Confession), a sequel to Thomas Wingfold, Curate
- Sir Gibbie (1879; republished as The Baronet’s Song)
- Mary Marston (1881; republished as A Daughter’s Devotion)
- Warlock o’ Glenwarlock (1881; republished as Castle Warlock and The Laird’s Inheritance)
- Weighed and Wanting (1882; republished as A Gentlewoman’s Choice)
- Donal Grant (1883; republished as The Shepherd’s Castle), a sequel to Sir Gibbie
- What’s Mine’s Mine (1886; republished as The Highlander’s Last Song)
- Home Again: A Tale (1887; republished as The Poet’s Homecoming)
- The Elect Lady (1888; republished as The Landlady’s Master)
- A Rough Shaking (1891)
- There and Back (1891; republished as The Baron’s Apprenticeship), a sequel to Thomas Wingfold, Curate and Paul Faber, Surgeon
- Heather and Snow (1893; republished as The Peasant Girl’s Dream)
- Salted with Fire (1896; republished as The Minister’s Restoration)
- Far Above Rubies (1898)
Poetry:
- Twelve of the Spiritual Songs of Novalis (1851), privately printed translation of the poetry of Novalis
- Within and Without: A Dramatic Poem (1855)
- Poems (1857)
- “A Hidden Life” and Other Poems (1864)
- “The Disciple” and Other Poems (1867)
- Exotics: A Translation of the Spiritual Songs of Novalis, the Hymn-book of Luther, and Other Poems from the German and Italian (1876)
- Dramatic and Miscellaneous Poems (1876)
- A Book of Strife, in the Form of the Diary of an Old Soul (1880), privately printed
- The Threefold Cord: Poems by Three Friends (1883), privately printed, with Greville Matheson and John Hill MacDonald
- Poems (1887)
- The Poetical Works of George MacDonald, 2 Volumes (1893)
- Scotch Songs and Ballads (1893)
- Rampolli: Growths from a Long-planted Root (1897)
Nonfiction:
- Unspoken Sermons (1867)
- England’s Antiphon (1868, 1874)
- The Miracles of Our Lord (1870)
- Cheerful Words from the Writing of George MacDonald (1880), compiled by E. E. Brown
- Orts: Chiefly Papers on the Imagination, and on Shakespeare (1882)
- “Preface” (1884) to Letters from Hell (1866) by Valdemar Adolph Thisted
- The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke: A Study With the Test of the Folio of 1623 (1885)
- Unspoken Sermons, Second Series (1885)
- Unspoken Sermons, Third Series (1889)
- A Cabinet of Gems, Cut and Polished by Sir Philip Sidney; Now, for the More Radiance, Presented Without Their Setting by George MacDonald (1891)
- The Hope of the Gospel (1892)
- A Dish of Orts (1893)
- Beautiful Thoughts from George MacDonald (1894), compiled by Elizabeth Dougall
Quotes on Universalism
“God will not conquer evil by crushing it under-foot-any god of man’s idea could do that-but by conquest of heart over heart, of life over life, of life over death, of love over all.”
“I believe that justice and mercy are simply one and the same thing. [I believe] such is the mercy of God that he will hold his children in the consuming fire of his distance until they pay the uttermost farthing, until they drop the purse of selfishness with all the dross that is in it, and rush home to the Father and the Son, and the many brethren, rush inside the center of the life-giving fire whose outer circles burn.”
“When souls have been ill-taught about God, the true God will not let them gaze too long upon the Moloch which men have set up to represent Him. He will turn away their minds from that which men call Him, and fill them with some of his own lovely thoughts or works, such as may by degrees prepare the way for a vision of the Father.”
“All those evil doctrines about god that work misery and madness have their origin in the brains of the wise and prudent, not in the hearts of children.”
“I believe that no hell will be lacking which would help the just mercy of God to redeem his children. Take any of those wicked people in Dante’s hell, and ask wherein is justice served by their punishment. Mind, I am not saying it is not right to punish them, I am saying, justice is not, never can be satisfied by suffering-nay, cannot have any satisfaction in or from suffering. Human resentment, human revenge, human hate may.”
“In God shall we imagine a distinction of office and character? Every attribute of God must be infinite as himself. Mercy, for example, cannot be temporary but eternal.”
“And what shall we say of the man Christ Jesus? Who, that loves his brother, would not, upheld by the love of Christ, and with a dim hope that in the far-off time there might be some help for him, arise from the company of the blessed, and walk down into the dismal regions of despair, to sit with the last, the only unredeemed, the Judas of his race, and be himself more blessed in the pains of hell, than in the glories of heaven? Who, in the midst of the golden harps and the white wings, knowing that one of his kind, one miserable brother in the old-world-time when men were taught to love their neighbor as themselves, was howling unheeded far below in the vaults of the creation, who, I say, would not feel that he must arise, that he had no choice, that, awful as it was, he must gird his loins, and go down into the smoke and the darkness and the fire, traveling the weary and fearful road into the far country to find his brother? — who, I mean, that had the mind of Christ, that had the love of the Father?”
“It cannot be that any creature should know him as he is and not desire him. He is always, and has ever been, sacrificing himself to and for his creatures. It lies in the very essence of his creation of them.”
“I do not myself believe that mere punishment exists anywhere in the economy of the highest. I think mere punishment is a human idea, not a divine one. But the consuming fire is more terrible to the evildoer than any idea of punishment invented by the most riotous of human imaginations. Punishment it is, though not mere punishment, which is a thing not of creation but destruction: it is a power of God and for his creature. As love is God’s being and creative energy in one, so the pains of God are to the recreation of the things his love has made, and sin has unmade.”
“Every soul that is ultimately lost is a defeat of the love of God.”
“Those who exalt free choice believe God must operate only within the sphere of our sovereignty.”
“God has to answer to himself for his idea; he has to do with the need of the nature he made, not with the self born choice of the self ruined man. His candle yet burns dim in the man’s soul; that candle must shine as the sun. For what is the all pervading dissatisfaction of his wretched being but an unrecognized hunger after the righteousness of his father. The soul God made is thus hungering, though the selfish, usurping self, which is its consciousness, is hungering only after low and selfish things, ever trying, but in vain, to fill its mean, narrow content, with husks too poor for its poverty stricken desires” (excerpt from: “The Voice of Job” as found in: Unspoken Sermons, Second Series by George MacDonald)
“Justice requires that sin should be put an end to.”
“Primarily, God is not bound to punish sin; he is bound to destroy sin. The only vengeance worth having on sin is to make the sinner himself its executioner.”
More information about George MacDonald can be found at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_MacDonald