How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
"You are so like [your mother] now," said Mary, "that sometimes I think perhaps you are her ghost made into a boy."
That idea seemed to impress Colin. He thought it over and then answered her slowly.
"If I were her ghost—my father would be fond of me."
"Do you want him to be fond of you?" inquired Mary.
"I used to hate it because he was not fond of me. If he grew fond of me I think I should tell him about the Magic. It might make him more cheerful." (25.39-43)
At first Mr. Craven rejects Colin because he worries that Colin is going to have a deformed spine like Mr. Craven's, but in this passage, Colin thinks Mr. Craven might give him another chance because Colin now looks much more like Mr. Craven's beloved deceased wife. Basically, it seems like Mr. Craven doesn't think of Colin as a separate person. He seems to consider Colin either as an outgrowth of something he hates about himself—his twisted back—or as something he misses too much to deal with—his dead wife.
Quote #8
"If she says that, it must be a nice song," Colin answered. "I've never been in a church myself. I was always too ill. Sing it, Dickon. I want to hear it."
Dickon was quite simple and unaffected about it. He understood what Colin felt better than Colin did himself. He understood by a sort of instinct so natural that he did not know it was understanding. He pulled off his cap and looked round still smiling.
"Tha' must take off tha' cap," he said to Colin, "an' so mun tha', Ben—an' tha' mun stand up, tha' knows." (26.29-31)
In this passage, Dickon introduces Colin to the idea that the Magic he keeps talking about is actually another word for Christian faith. As we get to the end of the book, we can see that The Secret Garden sets up a kind of equation for us, where good feelings are part of nature, and nature is part of God. Since Dickon is the character closest to nature in the book, he's also the one who feels religious faith almost by instinct.
Quote #9
One of the new things people began to find out in the last century was that thoughts—just mere thoughts—are as powerful as electric batteries—as good for one as sunlight is, or as bad for one as poison. To let a sad thought or a bad one get into your mind is as dangerous as letting a scarlet fever germ get into your body. If you let it stay there after it has got in you may never get over it as long as you live. (27.1)
Okay, what do you guys think of this philosophy? The narrator tells us two things at the beginning of The Secret Garden's last chapter: (1) Thinking positive thoughts is physically good for you, and (2) thinking negative thoughts can be as bad as a "scarlet fever germ."
While we may agree that positive thinking is a powerful thing, that part about avoiding negative thoughts puts a lot of pressure on a person's normal emotional responses. And if you refuse to acknowledge or even think about things that are paining you or hurting people around you, then how do you work to change those things?
What do you think? Are there some negative thoughts that might be helpful to your overall health? Or do you agree with Burnett that we need to "accentuate the positive [and] eliminate the negative," to borrow the words of music legend Johnny Mercer?