The love of the Father is a radiant perfection. Love and not self-love is Lord of the universe. Justice demands your punishment, because it demands that your Father should do his best for you. God, being the God of justice – that is of fair play – and having made us what we are (apt to fall and capable of being raised again) is himself bound to punish in order to deliver us.
— George MacDonald, Unspoken Sermons, Third Series, “Justice,” quoted in Discovering the Character of God, edited by Michael Phillips, p. 262