The Diary of an Old Soul Quotes

“When I can no more stir my soul to move, and life is but the ashes of a fire; when I can but remember that my heart once used to live and love, long and aspire- O, be thou then the first, the one thou art; be thou the calling, before all answering love, and in me wake hope, fear, boundless desire.”
― George MacDonald, The Diary of an Old Soul

“Love me, beloved; Hades and Death
Shall vanish away like a frosty breath;
These hands, that now are at home in thine,
Shall clasp thee again, if thou art still mine;
And thou shalt be mine, my spirit's bride,
In the ceaseless flow of eternity's tide,
If the truest love thy heart can know
Meet the truest love that from mine can flow.
Pray God, beloved, for thee and me,
That our sourls may be wedded eternally.”
― George MacDonald, The Diary of an Old Soul

“Doubt swells and surges, with swelling doubt behind!
My soul in storm is but a tattered sail,
Streaming its ribbons on the torrent gale;
In calm, 'tis but a limp and flapping thing:
Oh! swell it with thy breath; make it a wing,
To sweep through thee the ocean, with thee the wind
Nor rest until in thee its haven it shall find.

Roses are scentless, hopeless are the morns,
Rest is but weakness, laughter crackling thorns,

But love is life. To die of love is then
The only pass to higher life than this.
All love is death to loving, living men;
All deaths are leaps across clefts to the abyss.

Weakness needs pity, sometimes love's rebuke;
Strength only sympathy deserves and draws -
And grows by every faithful loving look.

Ripeness must always come with loss of might.”
― George MacDonald, The Diary of an Old Soul

“I am a beast until I love as God doth love.”
― George MacDonald, The Diary of an Old Soul

“When I no more can stir my soul to move, And life is but the ashes of a fire; When I can but remember that my heart Once used to live and love, long and aspire,— Oh, be thou then the first, the one thou art; Be thou the calling, before all answering love, And in me wake hope, fear, boundless desire.”
― George MacDonald, The Diary of an Old Soul

“Thou wouldst not have thy man crushed back to clay;
It must be, God, thou hast strength to give
To him that fain would do what thou dost say;
Else how shall any soul repentant live,
Old griefs and new fears hurrying on dismay?
Let pain be what thou wilt, kind and degree,
Only in pain calm thou my heart with thee.”
― George MacDonald, The Diary of an Old Soul

“I can no more than lift my weary eyes; Therefore I lift my weary eyes—no more. But my eyes pull my heart, and that, before 'Tis well awake, knocks where the conscience lies; Conscience runs quick to the spirit's hidden door: Straightway, from every sky-ward window, cries Up to the Father's listening ears arise.”
― George MacDonald, A Book of Strife in the Form of The Diary of an Old Soul