The figure of Aslan tells us more of how [C. S.] Lewis understood the nature of God more than anything else he wrote. It has all the hidden power and majesty and awesomeness which Lewis associated with God, but also the glory and the tenderness and even the humor which he believed belonged to him, so that children could run up to him and throw their arms around him.

Bede Griffiths, qtd. in Jack: A Life of C. S. Lewis, by George Sayer

From Augustine's Confessions (Chadwick's translation, pp. 4-5):

Who then are you, my God? What, I ask, but God who is Lord? For 'who is the Lord but the Lord', or 'who is God but our God?' (Ps. 17:32). Most high, utterly good, utterly powerful, most omnipotent, most merciful and most just, deeply hidden yet most intimately present, perfection of both beauty and strength, stable and incomprehensible, immutable and yet changing all things, never new, never old, making everything new and 'leading' the proud 'to be old without their knowledge' (Job 9:5, Old Latin version); always active, always in repose, gathering to yourself but not in need, supporting and filling and protecting, creating and nurturing and bringing to maturity, searching even though to you nothing is lacking: you love without burning, you are jealous in a way that is free of anxiety, you 'repent' (Gen. 6:6) without the pain of regret, you are wrathful and remain tranquil. You will a change without any change in your design. You recover what you find, yet have never lost.

Beauty matters. It is important to God. . . . Why else would he shape and color fish, birds, insects, rocks, plants, and people with such rich diversity? As my friend Elizabeth Rooney said, "Imagine making something as useful as a tree, as efficient at converting sunlight into food and fuel, as huge and tough as a white oak that can live 300 years, and then decorating it in spring with tiny pink leaves and pale green tassels of blossoms."

Luci Shaw, "Beauty and the Creative Impulse"

When the world was created, it might have seemed to be enough to have it work. To include beauty seems unnecessary for a mechanistic universe. We have been given a sense of the beautiful which can be regarded as gratuitous. Which it is--a gift of pure grace. And our own creation of beautiful things links us with our Creator. God was the first Quilter of prairies, the primal Painter (night skies, ferns, thunderheads, snow on cedars), the archetypal metal Sculptor (mountain ranges, icebergs), the Composer who heard the whales' strange, sonorous clickings and songs in his head long before there were whales to sound them, the Playwright who plotted the sweeping drama of Creation, Incarnation, Redemption, the Poet whose Word said it all.

Luci Shaw, "Beauty and the Creative Impulse"

O man, it is not you who make God, but rather God who makes you. Wait patiently for the hand of your Artist, who makes all things at the proper time. Present him with a heart that is supple and docile; preserve the imprint that this artist has given you; protect in yourself the Water that comes from Him, without which you will harden and lost the trace of his fingers. In preserving the modeling, you will mount up toward perfection, for the art of God will cover what in you is only clay. His hands have fashioned in you your very substance; he will adorn you with gold and silver, inside and out, and the King himself will be captured by your beauty."

Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies

For as God is infinitely the greatest Being, so he is allowed to be infinitely the most beautiful and the most excellent: and all the beauty to be found throughout the whole universe is but the reflection of the diffused beams of that Being who hath an infinite fulness of brightness and glory; God . . . is the foundation and fountain of all being and beauty.

Jonathan Edwards, The Nature of True Virtue