George MacDonald

The more I work with the body, keeping my assumptions in a temporary state of reservation, the more I appreciate and sympathize with a given disease. The body no longer appears as a sick or irrational demon, but as a process with its own inner logic and wisdom.

Few delights can equal the presence of one whom we trust utterly.

To be trusted is a greater compliment than being loved.

When we are out of sympathy with the young, then I think our work in this world is over.

To have what we want is riches but to be able to do without is power.

The best preparation for the future is the present well seen to, and the last duty done.

If instead of a gem, or even a flower, we should cast the gift of a loving thought into the heart of a friend, that would be giving as the angels give.

Forgiveness is the giving, and so the receiving, of life.

The principle part of faith is patience.

How strange this fear of death is! We are never frightened at a sunset.

It is our best work that God wants, not the dregs of our exhaustion. I think he must prefer quality to quantity.

Man finds it hard to get what he wants, because he does not want the best God finds it hard to give, because He would give the best, and man will not take it.

It is not in the nature of politics that the best men should be elected. The best men do not want to govern their fellowmen.

Attitudes are more important than facts.

Age is not all decay it is the ripening, the swelling, of the fresh life within, that withers and bursts the husk.