(Emphases mine)

In holy things may be unholy greed.
Thou giv’st a glimpse of many a lovely thing
Not to be stored for use in any mind,
But only for the present spiritual need.
The holiest bread, if hoarded, soon will breed
The mammon-moth, the having pride….

– George MacDonald, pg. 158

Had he had more of the wisdom of the serpent…he would perhaps have known that to try too hard to make people good is one way to make them worse; that the only way to make them good is to be good–remembering well the beam and the mote; that the time for speaking comes rarely, the time for being never departs.

– ibid, pg. 155