"The latter part of the journey was not so pleasant: it rained… Malcolm was merry. His spirits always rose at the appearance of bad weather, as indeed with every show of misfortune a response antagonistic invariably awoke in him..."

"…he would on most nights be lying in wait a short distance down the Widdiehill, ready to minister to that one of his father's old comrades who might prove most in need of his assistance..."

"…kindness was to Gibbie the very milk of mother Nature. Whose the hand that proffered it, or what the form it took, he cared no more than a stray kitten cares whether the milk set down to it be in a blue saucer or a white. But he always made the right return..."

"…the mere motion of time, not to say the consciousness of empty time, is fearful. It is this empty time that the fool is always trying to kill: his effort should be to fill it..."

"He had confidence in God and in his own powers as the gift of God, and knew that wherever he went he needed not be hungry long, even should the little money in his pocket be spent. It is better to trust in work than in money: God never buys anything, and is for ever at work..."

"All that we have to think of is to do right—not the consequences of doing right." George MacDonald (From "The Seaboard Parish," Vol.I, CHAPTER VI, THE NEW BABY)

"All things belong to every man who yields his selfishness, which is his one impoverishment, and draws near to his wealth, which is humanity—not humanity in the abstract, but the humanity of friends and neighbours and all men..."

"If Cornelius had begun at any time, without other compulsion than the urging within him, to do something he knew he ought to do, he would not now have been the poor slave of circumstances he was—at the call and beck of the weather—such, in fact, as the weather willed...

"We are all good and all bad. God mend all." George Macdonald (From "ROBERT FALCONER," BOOK I, CHAPTER XVI, MR. LAMMIE'S FARM)

"…there is a peculiar power of decay inherent in things deprived of use." George Macdonald (From "David Elginbrod," Chapter XVI, Forebodings)

"Remember, nothing drops out; everything hid shall be revealed. But of all things, if ever you should fail or fall, don't lie still because you are down: get up again—for God's sake, for your mother's sake, for my sake—get up and try again." George Macdonald

" ‘For, ye see,’ he said, ‘a mither’s a mither, be she the verra de’il.’ " George Macdonald

“ 'Won’t you be frightened, Andrew?' I asked. “ 'Frightened? What should I be frightened at? It’s all waste to be frightened before you know whether the thing is worth it.' ...

"For ten days or so, she could form no idea of what she was likely or would like to do next. But, when we are in such perplexity, may not the fact be accepted as showing that decision is not required of us—perhaps just because our way is at the moment being made straight for us?" George Macdonald

"It often seems to those in earnest about the right as if all things conspired to prevent their progress. This of course is but an appearance, arising in part from this, that the pilgrim must be headed back from the side paths into which he is constantly wandering." George Macdonald

"Do ye what's richt…and sae defy fowk and fairy." George Macdonald (From Alec Forbes of Howglen," CHAPTER IV)

"Something fresh began to stir in his mind; even as in the spring, away in far depths of beginning, the sap gives it first upward throb in the tree, and the first bud, as yet invisible, begins to jerk itself forward to break from the cerements of ante-natal quiescence, and become a growing leaf..."

"…Mary pondered what she could do to make life more of life to her. Not many knew better than she that the only true way to help a human heart is to lift it up; but she knew also that every kind of loving aid tends more or less to that uplifting..."

"She came to herself, and then first knew that, like sleep, the music had seized her unawares, and she had been understanding, or at least enjoying, without knowing it." "Mary Marston," CHAPTER XXXV, THE MUSICIAN gmdreflections.substack.com/p/the-hidden...

"If people were both observant and memorious, they would cease, I fancy, to be astonished at coincidences. Rightly regarded, the universe is but one coincidence—only where will has to be developed, there is need for human play, and room for that must be provided in its spaces..."

"…Dr. Ruthwell…was one of the few in the profession, whose love of science and love of their fellows combined, would be enough to chain them to the art of healing, irrespective of its emoluments..."

"It was…he said, a principle in the history of the world, that evil should bring forth good, and his poor little cock-boat had been set adrift upon an ocean of blessing." George MacDonald (From "The Marquis of Lossie," CHAPTER LXX, THE DISCLOSURE)

"Have you a library?" asked Lady Joan—mainly to say something, for she was not particularly fond of books; like most people she had not yet learned to read." George MacDonald (From "Warlock o' Glenwarlock," CHAPTER XVI, THROUGH THE DAY) ---- What is it to really learn to read?

"A man must do a thing because it is right, even if he die for it; but truth were poor indeed if it did not bring at last all things subject to it! As beauty and truth are one, so are truth and strength one." George MacDonald (From "Donal Grant," CHAPTER XIV, THE SCHOOLROOM)

"Most men who learn would learn more, I suspect, if they had work to do, and difficulty in the way of learning." George MacDonald (From "There and Back," CHAPTER X, THE LIBRARY)

"…actions in themselves good, however imperfect the motives that give rise to them, react blissfully upon character and nature. It is better to be an atheist who does the will of God, than a so-called Christian who does not." George MacDonald

“. . . I hae had what’s ca’d a good education—though I hae learned mair frae my ain needs than frae a’ my buiks.” [“. . . I have had what’s called a good education—though I have learned more from my own needs than from all my books.”] George MacDonald

"…he did not know that there are many other educations besides a college one, some of them tending far more than that to develope the common-sense, or faculty of judging of things by their nature…"

“A man must do his duty, if he would be a free man, whether he likes it or not, and whether it is appreciated or not. But if he can regard it as the will of God, the work not fallen upon him by chance, but given him to do, understanding that every thing well done belongs to His kingdom..."

"Gibbie had been honoured with the acquaintance of many dogs, and the friendship of most of them, for a lover of humanity can hardly fail to be a lover of caninity… Mankind had disappointed him, but here was a dog!" George MacDonald (From "Sir Gibbie," CHAPTER VIII, SAMBO)

"Sweet earthy odors rose about Mary from the wet ground; the rain-drops glittered on the grass and corn-blades and hedgerows; a soft damp wind breathed rather than blew about the gaps and gates; with an upward springing, like that of a fountain momently gathering strength..."

"It seems to me, at least, in my great ignorance, that one cannot understand music unless he is humble toward it, and consents, if need be, not to understand. When one is quiescent, submissive, opens the ears of the mind, and demands of them nothing more than the hearing—..."

“ 'Papa,' I said, “why did you say we have done a wrong? You did not do it.' “ 'My dear boy, persons who are so near each other as we are, must not only bear the consequences together of any wrong done by one of them, but must, in a sense, bear each other’s iniquities even..."

"I have no time to grow old," said the lady. "I am too busy for that. It is very idle to grow old." George MacDonald (From "The Golden Key")

"…She slept little during the night, starting awake as often as she began to slumber, and before the morning came was a good deal humbled. All sorts of means are kept at work to make the children obedient and simple and noble. Joy and sorrow are servants in God’s nursery..."

"Some of our thoughts are worth nothing, because they've got no soul in them. The brain puts them into the mind, not the mind into the brain." George MacDonald (From "At the Back of the North Wind," CHAPTER XXXVII, ONCE MORE)

"…if by any argument addressed to his moral or religious nature his mind could have been a little eased, his physical nature would most likely have at once responded in improvement…

"…When he was tempted to any self-indulgence, the thought would always rise that this was not the way to become able to help people, especially the real selves of them… To do a man good in any way, you must sympathise with him—that is, know what he feels, & reflect the feeling in your own mirror..."

"...many things were spoken by the simple wisdom of David, which would have enlightened Hugh far more than they did, had he been sufficiently advanced to receive them. But their very simplicity was often far beyond the grasp of his thoughts; for the higher we rise, the simpler we become..."

"It was as if suffering had removed some substance unapt, and rendered her body a better-fitting garment for her soul… It was as if the nerves had grown finer, more tremulous, or, rather, more vibrative..."

"Did it ever strike you…that each one of us stands on the apex of the world? With a sphere, you know, it must be so. And thus is typified, as it seems to me, that each one of us must look up for himself to find God, and then look abroad to find his fellows...”

"They did not reckon what strength the additional motive, what heart the new love, what uplifting the hope of help from on high, kindled by their righteous deed, might give them—..."

"All the doors to bliss have their defences of swamps and thorny thickets through which alone they can be gained." George Macdonald (From "The Marquis of Lossie," CHAPTER LXIV, A VISITATION)

"She could endure marvellously; but without love and its joy she could not live, in any real sense. In uncongenial society, her whole mental faculty had frozen; when love came, her mental world, like a garden in the spring sunshine, blossomed and budded." George Macdonald

"The youth's manners had a certain—what shall I call it?—not polish, but rhythm, which came of, or at least was nourished by his love of the finer elements in literature. His friendly converse with books, & through them with certain of the dead who still speak, fell in with yet deeper influences..."

"One hundred bells hang in that tower of wonder, an instrument for a city, nay, for a kingdom. Often had Robert dreamed that he was the galvanic centre of a thunder-cloud of harmony, flashing off from every finger the willed lightning tone: such was the unexpected scale of this instrument—..."

"Mrs. Boxall's good-natured audacity generally carried everything before it, even with more dangerous persons than her own husband. He could not help—I do not say smiling, but trying to smile; and though the smile was rather a failure, Mrs. Boxall chose to take it for one..."

"During our meal, he made himself quite agreeable; talked well on the topics of the day, not altogether as a man who had made up his mind, but not the less, rather the more, as a man who had thought about them, and one who did not find it so easy to come to a conclusion as most people do—..."

"…what is the most precious gift one person can give another?” …

"…we need not anticipate evil: that is to send out for the suffering. It is well to be prepared for it, but it is ill to brood over a fancied future of evil. In all my life, my boy—and I should like you to remember what I say—I have never found any trial go beyond what I could bear..."