His best characters are those which
reveal how much real charity and spiritual wisdom can co-exist with
the profession of a theology that seems to encourage neither.
MacDonald illustrates not the doubtful maxim that to know all is to
forgive all, but the unshakable truth that to forgive is to know. He
who loves, sees. ~ CS Lewis
Headed over to the dark side today, even if just for a bit. I don't usually choose science fiction or darkness in books, but this new year, I've determined to step up and stretch my fiction writing skills. Therefore, I'm stretching my reading roster. In
Lilith, I got more than I bargained. I really don't have much to add, but to say that this book speaks to me. I'm not quite through it yet, and will likely post more quotes. But, oh the words and truths. Sister and I read the passage on Eve and Lilith the other day; it sparked quite the conversation.
Lilith Quotes
When a heart is really alive, then
it is able to think live things.
All live things were thoughts to
begin with, and are fit therefore to be used by those that think.
When one says to the great Thinker: - “Here is one of thy thoughts:
I am thinking it now!” that is a prayer – a word to the big heart
from one of it's own little hearts.
Indeed the business of the universe
is to make such a fool of you that you will know yourself for one,
and so begin to be wise.
You can tell what sort a man is by
his creature that comes oftenest to the front.
Your world is such a half-baked sort
of place, it is at once so childish and so self satisfied.
You know nothing about whereness.
The only way to come to know where you are is to begin to make
yourself a home.
“Two objects,” I
said, “cannot exist in the same place at the same time.”
"Can they not? I did not know! - I
remember now they do teach that with you. It is a great mistake - one
of the greatest ever wiseacre made! No man of the universe, only a
man of the world could have said so!" ~ The Raven
Of Little Ones
“She will never go bad and grow
big! When they begin to grow big they care for nothing but bigness;
and when they cannot grow any bigger, they try to grow fatter. The
bad giants are very proud of being fat.” “So they are in my
world.” I said, “only
they do not say fat there, they say rich.”
“He is forever eating those apples
now!” she said. “That is what comes of Little Ones that
won't be little!”
“They call it growing up in my
world!” I said to myself. “If only she would teach me to
grow the other way, and become a Little One! - Shall I ever be able
to laugh like them?”
Pondering as I
went, I recalled many traits of my little friends.
Once
when I suggested that they should leave the country of the bad
giants, and go with me to find another, they answered, “But
that would be to not ourselves!” -
so strong in them was the love of place that their country seemed
essential to their very being! Without ambition or fear, discomfort
or greed, they had no motive to desire any change; they knew of
nothing amiss; and, except their babies, they had never had a chance
of helping anyone but myself: - How were they to grow? But again, why
should they grow? In seeking to improve their conditions, might I not
do them harm, and only harm? To enlarge their minds after the notions
of my world – might it not be to distort and weaken them? Their
fear of growth as a possible start for giant-hood might be
instinctive!
In this world never trust a person
who has once deceived you. Above all, never do anything such a one
may ask you to do.
In Bulika (The Evil Netherlands)
“Doubt,” I
said to myself, “may be a poor encouragement to do
anything, but it is a bad reason for doing nothing.”
I was too daring: a
man must not, for knowledge, of his own will encounter temptation! On
the other hand, I had reinstated an evil force about to perish, and
was, to the extent of my opposing faculty, accountable for what
mischief might ensue!
I
asked how they were rich if none of them earned money. She replied
that their ancestors had saved for them, and they never spent. When
they wanted money they sold a few of their gems. “But
there must be some poor!” I
said.
“I suppose there must be, but we
never think of such people. When one goes poor, we forget him. That
is how we keep rich. We mean to be rich always.”
“But when you have dug up all your
precious stones and sold them, you will have to spend your money, and
one day you will have none left!”
Every now and then
as she spoke, she would stop and look behind her.
I asked why her
people had such a hatred of strangers.
She answered that
the presence of a stranger defiled the city.
“How is that?”
I said.
“Because we are more ancient and
noble than any other nation. - Therefore,” she
added, “we always turn strangers out before night.”
Mr. Vane comes
out of Bulika and is home in the library. He was saved from the
Princess; pulled through the Silent Fountain by the Raven
When a man will not act where he is,
he must go far to find work.
But for the weeping in it, your
world would never have become worth saving!
Is not a little knowledge, a
dangerous thing?
That is one of the pet falsehoods of
your world! Is a man's greatest knowledge more than a little – or
is it therefore dangerous? The fancy that knowledge is in itself a
great thing would make any degree of knowledge more dangerous than
any amount of ignorance. To know all things would not be greatness.
The
Persian Cat
“But if I
found a man that could believe
In what he saw
not, felt not, and yet knew,
From him I
should take substance, and receive
Firmness and
form related to touch and view,
then should I
clothe me in the likeness true
Of that idea
where his soul did cleave!
At
these words such a howling, such a prolonged yell of agony burst from
the cat , that we both stopped our ears.... “Now we have
her, I think!” and returning
to the cat, stood over her and said, in a still, solemn voice:-
“Lilith, when
you came here on the way to your evil will, you little thought into
whose hands you were delivering yourself! - Mr. Vane, when God
created me – not out of glory – He brought me an angelic splendor
to be my wife: there she lies! For her first thought was power; she
counted it slavery to be one with me, and bear children for Him who
gave her being. One child, indeed, she bore, then, puffed with the
fancy that she had created her, would have me fall down and worship
her! Finding, however, that I would but love and honour her, never
obey and worship her, she poured out her blood to escape me, fled to
the army of the aliens, and soon had so ensnared the heart of the
great Shadow, that he became her slave, wrought her will, and made
her Queen of Hell.
The one child
of her body, she fears and hates, and would kill, asserting a right,
which is a lie, over what God sent through her into His new world. Of
creating, she knows no more than the crystal that takes its allotted
shape, or the worm that makes two worms when it is cloven asunder.
Vilest of God's creatures, she lives by the blood and lives and souls
of men. She consumes and slays, but is powerless to destroy as to
create.
The animal lay motionless, it's beryl eyes fixed, flaming on the
man: his eyes on hers held them fixed that they could not move from
his.
“Then God
gave me another wife – not an angel but a woman – who is to this
as light is to darkness.”
The cat gave a horrible screech, and began to grower bigger. She went
on growing and growing. At last the spotted leopardess uttered a roar
that made the house tremble. I sprang to my feet. I do not think Mr.
Raven started even with his eyelids.
“It is but
her jealousy that speaks,” he
said, “jealousy self-kindled, foiled and fruitless, for
here I am, her master now, whom she would not have for her husband!
While my beautiful Eve yet lives, hoping immortally! Her hated
daughter lives also, but beyond her evil ken, one day to be what she
counts her destruction – for even Lilith shall be saved by her
childbearing. Meanwhile she exults that my human wife plunged herself
and me in despair, and has borne me a countless race of miserables;
but my Eve repented, and is now beautiful as never was a woman or
angel, while her groaning, travailing world is the nursery of our
Father's children. I too have repented, and am blessed. - Thou,
Lilith, has not yet repented, but thou must. - Tell me, is the great
Shadow beautiful? - Answer me, if thou knowest.”
Then at last I understood that Mr. Raven was indeed Adam the old and
the new man, and that his wife, ministering in the house of the dead,
was Eve, the mother of us all, the lady of the New Jerusalem.
“I am
beautiful - and immortal !” Lilith
said. - and she looked the goddess she would be.
“As a bush
that burns, and is consumed,” answered
he who had been her husband.
“Lilith,”
said Adam, and his tone had
changed to a tender beseeching, “hear me, and repent, and
He who made thee will cleanse thee!”
She gave the cry of one from whom hope is vanishing. The cry passed
into a howl. She lay writhing on the floor, a leopardess covered with
spots.
“The evil
thou meditatest,” Adam
resumed, “thou shalt never compass, Lilith, for Good and
not Evil is the Universe. The battle between them may last countless
ages, but it must end: how will it fare with thee when Time hath
vanished in the dawn of the eternal morn? Repent, I beseech thee,
repent, and be again an angel of God!”
She rose, she stood upright, a woman once more, and said,
“I will not
repent. I will drink the blood of thy child.”
My eyes were fastened on the princess; but when Adam spoke, I turned
to him: he stood towering above her; the form of his visage was
altered, and his voice was terrible.
“Down!” he
cried; “or by the power given me I will melt thy very
bones!”
She flung herself on the floor, dwindled and dwindled, and was again
a gray cat. Adam caught her up by the skin of her neck, bore her to
the closet, and threw her in. He described a strange figure on the
threshold, and closing the door, locked it.
Then he
returned to my side the old librarian, looking sad and worn, and
furtively wiping tears from his eyes.
Jewish Lilith Theology
* I love MacDonald's use of punctuation. There's hope for those who use commas generously!
