Victorian Things

Items

• George MacDonald's Copy of "Aids to Reflection"
  These images come from a copy of Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s "Aids to Reflection" that belonged to Victorian author George MacDonald. One image shows the volume’s title page. This page is yellowed by time and contains a handwritten inscription in black ink in the top right corner to Louisa Powell, along with the date, “Nov. 5. 1847.” Below this inscription and the printed title is a sonnet written in the same script as the name and date. The first few letters of each line of the sonnet are obscured by the crease of the page. Other images show the black-and-white bookplate, bearing the name of “Greville Matheson MacDonald” and set against colourful marbled paper. The illustration on the bookplate depicts two figures, a muscular young man sitting atop a cavernous entryway shrouded in darkness, and another man, stooped with age, carrying a cane, and walking across the threshold of the same entrance. The darkness of the entryway contrasts with light emitting from the young man. The lintel of the cave bears the text “Corage! God mend al!” while the left post bears an image of a hand holding up a cross and the Latin text “per mare per terras domum tu erras” (“through sea and through land, you wander homeward”). At the bottom left-hand corner of the doorway is a Latin epsilon followed by the text “x Libris.” The book is currently held at the Armstrong Browning Library and Museum at Baylor University as part of their George MacDonald collection. The inscription (as transcribed by Dr. Denae Dyck and Dr. Melinda Creech) reads as follows: [?Whether] this day on earth shall often be, [?I h]ave no wish that I can make for thee. [?Nor] will I wish thee ever cloudless years. [?Why] wish thee that which cannot be, I know [?That] as the sun must shine, so clouds must grow. [?And] as our being is, so are our tears: [?And] one who hath given thanks for sorrow’s hour [?May] never pray thou shouldst not know its power; [?Ye]t there is one thing I can wish for thee – [?That] the unbounded promise may be thine [?When] all things in one Providence combine [?So]rrows and joys in glorious unity – [?But] bright or dark, unknown or understood, [?All] things work together for thy good.