Growing With My Garden

The plot hastens to conclusion  now.  Lord Forgue reappears with the facade of a  gentleman, under which are attitudes of superiority combined with disdain and contempt for Donal.  He proposes to Actura and she refuses him.   Determined that the castle, which belongs to Actura, should go to Forgue, Morven sends Donal and Davie on a vacation to visit Donal’s parents.  Then he deceives Actura, drugs her, and confines her in the hidden room in the depths of the castle, leaving her to die on the same bed on which he had placed his wife.  Donal feels called by God to return to the castle, finds and frees Acutra.  ANY REACTIONS TO THE STORY, OR REFLECTIONS ON IT? Next week’s reading finishes this novel.  We plan to turn next to the collection of C. S. Lewis’s essays entitled God in the Dock.  I will post a schedule of assignments next week.  

 Donal and Actura finally descend into the hidden room and find on a bed a decayed corpse.  Donal tells her that “this house is like every human soul. . . . “ He was certain Actura would never be quite herself “until the daylight entered the chapel and all the hidden places of the house were open to the air of God’s world.” (Chapter 43).   The wrongs of a person’s past lie dead within the consciousness and must be dealt with.  So with us all.  All our consciousness should be open to God, but we should not let anything in our past of which we are ashamed bother us.   We are forgiven. The text increasingly focuses upon  Morwen’s inner state, and in so doing GMD is describing that of the deeply depraved human being. When Lord Morven summons Donal for a talk on free will he begins to reveal some of the agonies of his own consciousness.  In their conversation GMD reveals his own view about one of the most teasing of theological questions: h...

We remarked earlier that there is a teasing symbolism presented in our story.  The castle can be seen to suggest the mystery of the human mind.  Donal confirms this when he remarks: “A house is so like a human mind . . . .”  Actura questions: “the house is therefore a fit outside to my inner nature–as the shell fits the snail?”  (p 244).  In their conversation that follows GMD reveals much of his understanding of the working of the Spirit within the human mind, and this is further developed in our reading for this week, especially in Chapter 32.  Note that the castle belongs to both  Lord Morwen and Arctura, and it is they who hear and are mystified by the sounds and are responding to them.  They represent two quite different spiritual types. It must be emphasized that MacDonald is not writing allegory here, and it is folly to attempt to see allegorical significance in all the images.   But the sounds are produced by soft and low blo...

  It is interesting to observe how much Christian truth GMD conveys to his readers through the story.  In episodes in which Donal teaches and explains concepts to Davie, he is teaching his readers.  He is quite aware that by writing novels he has a great many more readers than by writing sermons, and in believable scenes in novels he can show how relevant to life Christian truths are.   As the ideal Christian Donal desires to be of help in whatever situations he finds himself, but is uncertain just what to do.  In his encounters with the Lord Forgue and Eppie, with the Comins, and with the mysterious actions of Lord Morven, he is observant and concerned, acting as a friend, but not imposing himself in any intrusive or  dictatorial manner.  It is pertinent to remark that GMD is drawing from his own experience. When he was a young man, freshly graduated from King’s College, and employed as a tutor in London, he went through a difficult period ...

  The description of Graeme’s garden in Chapter 14 highlights one of GMD’s insistences, that is the importance of appreciating nature and feeling a kinship with it.   Such is a great help to a healthy spiritual life.  Donal remarks: “Man ought to learn of nature. . . . His work is, through the forms that nature gives him, to express the idea or feeling that is in him.” One of the unfortunate aspects of our present society is the way most people’s lives are severed from nature and it is looked upon simply as something to be exploited for our material benefit, rather than the environment which God created as a proper context for healthy spiritual lives.  Our novel begins with beautiful descriptions of Donal’s natural environment, and there are several throughout.  One of the strengths of GMD’s writing is the giving of such descriptions.  Donal’s interaction with nature is one of the factors that contributes to his stature as an ideal Christian, enabl...

  Donal’s conversation with Davie in Chapter 13 introduces one of the chief themes of the novel, that is the need to understand oneself aright, which we shall see as we read further along is symbolically placed in terms of the larger mystery of the working of God within the  human consciousness. In so many of his writings GMD explores the mystery of the nature of the human psyche in relation to the divine.  One provocative instance occurs in the fairy story The Princess and the Goblins, which was written some ten years before our novel.  In that story the castle in which Irene lives can be seen as a symbol of the human mind, with the great-great grandmother–a symbol of the divine presence–dwelling in its uppermost heights, while deep down below is a colony of goblins, representing our baser instincts.  Irene, the main character, dwells in the middle.  She has freedom to climb up high and visit with the divine, or she can be enthralled and captured by in...

  As the story opens, we see Donal walking across Scotland towards an unknown destiny, which turns out to be living in a large castle where he is to be a tutor to a young boy.  His early life has been given in the novel Sir Gibbie, where he is seen growing up as a shepherd boy, spending his days tending sheep and cattle and delighting in his rural environment.  As a young man he went to college, got his degree, and is now facing life as a young adult. Thus oriented to life, Donal displays convincingly throughout the novel ideal Christian attitudes, and in the first chapter GMD describes that utter reliance upon God which produces inner peace in all the outer circumstances of life.  Donal accepts negative circumstances without complaint and expectantly awaits what may happen next.  Many passages are memorable, such as: “He had no certain goal, though he knew his direction and was in no haste.  He had confidence in God and in his own powers as the gift...