Life Essential: The Hope of the Gospel

"... I know hardly any other writer who seems to be closer, or more continually cloxe, to the Spirit of Christ Himself. Hence his Christ-like union of tenderness and severity. Nowhere else outside the New Testament have I found terror and comfort so intertwined. "I have never concealed the fact that I regarded him as my master; indeed I fancy I never written a book in which I did not quote from him. But it has not seemed to me that those who have received my books kindly take even now sufficient notice of the affiliation. Honesty drives me to emphasize it." -- C.S. Lewis, in the preface to George MacDonald: An Anthology

George MacDonald (1824-1905) is best known as a novelist, the author of fantasies such as Phantastes (1858) and Lilith (1895) and realistic works like David Elginbrod (1863) and Alec Forbes of Howglen (1865). He was also, however, a respected religious teacher. He pastored only one church — Trinity Congregational Church, Arundel, 1850-1853 — before turning to novels and poems, but he continued to preach and publish sermons after achieving literary fame.