Happy Birthday George MacDonald!

"Now Phantastes ... had about it a sort of cool, morning innocence ... What it actually did to me was to convert, even to baptise ... my imagination." C. S. Lewis

When I read what C S Lewis said about George MacDonald, I had to try him out for myself. Immediately, my goal for that year of reading all I could of Lewis was vanquished.
I'd found my mentor, my soul-echo, and without the smell of a pub. I still love that Irishman who led me to MacDonald but Lewis is such a manly man. He's such a guy's guy. He couldn't begin to speak to my heart from the tavern bench or his academic desk the way my Scotsman sang from the moors. 'Baptise', immerse, set free indeed. George MacDonald allowed me to believe that God and His world are as wonderful and lovely as I'd hoped in my deepest desires.
He has taught me to think and notice; love and trust.

From Diary of an Old Soul by George MacDonald
Dec. 11 ....then shall I live such an essential life
That a mere flower will then to me unfold
More bliss than now grandest orchestral strife-
By love made and obedience humble-bold.
I shall straight through its window God behold;
God, I shall feed on thee, thy creature blest
With very being-work at one with sweetest rest.

Happy Birthday, George, soul-echo!