man's need of social ties and connections. Silas forsook his old life, the
life of his childhood and youth, and the world was a blank for him in
consequence. With the sundering of the ties which bound him to the
traditional environment amidst which he was reared, all the purpose and
meaning of his life was gone. The old ties, obligations and associations
gone, his life was without anchorage, its ideal aims perished, and he lived
a selfish and worthless creature. When new social ties were formed by the
young child he found then his life opened up to a larger meaning again, and
he recovered the better things in his nature. He was then led back again
into his relations to society, he became once more a man, a fresh life was
opened to him. This brought a new confidence in religion, a new trust in
the moral motives of life. In this way George Eliot presents the social
basis of the higher life in man, and her theory that it cannot be broken
off from its traditional surroundings without grave injury to the finer
elements of our nature. The law of retribution manifests itself clearly in
these pages. Godfrey deserts wife and child. In after years he would fain
restore the child to its rightful place, but he finds it has grown up under
conditions which alienate it from any sympathy with him. He pronounces his
own condemnation:
"There's debts we can't pay like money debts, by paying extra for the
years that have slipped by. While I've been putting off and putting
off, the trees have been growing--it's too late now. Marner was in the
right in what he said about a man's turning away a blessing from his
door: it falls to somebody else. I wanted to pass for childless once,
Nancy--I shall pass for childless now against my wish."
A pure moral tone, a keen ethical instinct, mark all these earlier novels
by George Eliot. Quite as noticeable is their spiritual atmosphere and
their high place assigned to the religious life. Their teaching in these
directions has a conservative tendency, and it is based on the most
vigorous convictions.
XIV.
ROMOLA.
Whatever differences there may exist between George Eliot's earlier and
later books are due rather to the materials used than to any change in
purpose, methods or beliefs. In writing of the distinction drawn between
her earlier and later books, she said,--
Though I trust there is some growth in my appreciation of others and in
my self-distrust, there has been no change in the point of view from
which I regard our life since I wrote my first fiction, the _Scenes of
Clerical Life_. Any apparent change of spirit must be due to something
of which I am unconscious. The principles which are at the root of my
effort to paint Dinah Morris are equally at the root of my effort to
paint Mordecai.
Her later books grow more out of conscious effort and deliberate study than
the earlier, are more carefully wrought out, and contain less of
spontaneity. The spiritual and ethical purpose, however, is not more
distinct and conscious in _Daniel Deronda_ than in _The Mill on the Floss_,
in _Romola_ than in _Adam Bede_. The ethical purpose may be more apparent
in _Daniel Deronda_ than in _Adam Bede_, more on the surface, and clearer
to the view of the general reader, but this is because it takes an unusual
form, rather than because it is really any more distinctly present. In _The
Mill on the Floss_ her teaching first became known to her readers, and in
_Romola_ this purpose to use the novel as the vehicle for propagating ideas
became fully apparent. Her aim having once come clearly to view, it was not
difficult to see how large an element it was in her earlier books, where it
had not been seen before. If she had written nothing but _Adam Bede_ her
teachings might not have come to light, though some of those she has most
often insisted on are to be found clearly stated in that book. Her
doctrinal aim, however, became more clear and pronounced as she went on in
her career as a novelist, and became more thoroughly conscious of her own
powers and of the purposes which she wished to work out in her novels. She
gained courage to express her ideas, and their importance was more deeply
impressed upon her mind and heart.
In _Romola_ it was first made clear that George Eliot is to be judged as a
moralist as well as a literary artist. That she is a great literary artist,
surpassed only by a select few, is to be borne constantly in mind; but as a
moralist she surpasses most others in the amount of her teaching, and
teaching which is thoroughly incorporated into the literary fibre of her
work. She much resembles Wordsworth in this, that while she is an original
creator of artistic forms and ideas, her books will be sought for their
views of life as well for their qualities as novels. Wordsworth is a poet
of vast original powers, but the poetic fire in him often burns low and his
verses become mere prose. Yet his ideas about nature, life and morals
command for him a place higher than that occupied by any other poet of his
time, and a school of thinkers and critics has been developed through his
influence. In much the same way, George Eliot is likely to attract
attention because of her teachings; and it is probable her books will be
resorted to and interpreted largely with reference to her moral and
philosophical ideas. Should such a movement as this ever spring up,
_Romola_ will necessarily become one of the most important of all her
books. Some of her principal ideas appear therein more distinctly, in
clearer outline, and with a greater fulness of expression, than they obtain
in any other of her books. The foreign setting of her story enabled her to
give a larger utterance to her thoughts, while there was less of personal
and pathetic interest to impede their expression. This is also true of _The
Spanish Gypsy_, that it has more of teaching and less of merely literary
attraction than any other of her longer poems. The purpose to do justice to
the homely life of rustic England was no longer present, and she was free
to give her intellectual powers a deliberate expression in the form of a
thoughtful interpretation of a great historic period. Mr. Henry James, Jr.,
has recognized the importance of this effort, and says of _Romola_, that
he regards it, "on the whole, as decidedly the most important of her
works,--not the most entertaining nor the most readable, but the one in
which the largest things are attempted and grasped. The figure of
Savonarola, subordinate though it is, is a figure on a larger scale than
any which George Eliot has elsewhere undertaken; and in the career of Tito
Melema there is a fuller representation of the development of a character.
Considerable as are our author's qualities as an artist, and largely as
they are displayed in _Romola_, the book is less a work of art than a work
of morals. Like all of George Eliot's works, its dramatic construction is
feeble; the story drags and halts,--the setting is too large for the
picture."
The book lacks in spontaneity, is too deliberate, contemplative and
ethical. While its artistic elements are great, and even powerful, it is
too consciously moral in its purpose to satisfy the literary requirements
of a work of art. It wants the sensuous elements of life and the _abandon_
of poetic genius. There is little which is sensational about the book; too
little, perhaps, of that vivid imaginative interest which impels the reader
headlong through the pages of a novel to the end. It is, however, a high
merit in George Eliot, that she does not resort to factitious elements of
interest in her books, but works honestly, conscientiously, and with a pure
purpose. If the reader is not drawn on by the sensational, he is amply
repaid by the more deliberate and natural interest which gives a meaning to
every chapter.
George Eliot selected for her book one of the most striking and picturesque
periods of modern history, in the great centre of culture and art in the
fifteenth century. Florence was the intellectual capital of the world in
the renaissance period, and the truest representative of its spirit. It was
the time also of that remarkable monk-prophet, Savonarola, whose voice was
raised so powerfully against the corruptions of that most corrupt age. This
unique character, doubtless, had much to do in causing George Eliot to take
this city and time for her story. No one of the reformers of the fifteenth
and sixteenth centuries was more in earnest, had a loftier purpose, worked
in a nobler spirit, than this Dominican monk of Florence. His opposition to
the Medici, his conflict with Rome, his visions and prophecies, his
leadership of the politics of Florence, his powerful preaching, his
untimely death, all give a romantic and a tragic interest to his life, and
conspire to make him one of the most interesting figures in modern history.
His moral purpose was conspicuous even when tainted by personal ambition.
His political influence was supreme while it lasted, and was wielded in the
interests of Florence, for its liberties and its moral regeneration. As a
religious teacher he was profoundly in earnest; a prophet in his own belief
as well as in the depth of his religious insight, he accepted with the most
thorough intensity of conviction the spiritual truths he inculcated. In his
own belief he was constantly in communion with the spiritual world, and was
guided and taught by it. He swayed the people of Florence as the wind sways
the branches of a tree, and they bowed utterly to his will for the moment,
when he put forth all his moral and intellectual powers in the pulpit. A
puritan in morals, he had a most vivid realization of the terrible evils of
his time; and he could make his congregation look at the world with his own
faith and moral purpose. His influence on literature and art was also
great, and it was felt for many years after his death.
Savonarola spoke in the pulpit with the authority of the profoundest
personal conviction, and his hearers were impressed by his preaching with
the feeling that they listened to one who knew whereof he spoke. Whenever
he preached there was a crowd to hear; people came three or four hours
before the time, and they came in throngs from the surrounding country. He
held separate services for men, for women, for children, in order that all
might hear. And this eagerness to listen to him was not for a few weeks,
but it continued for years. The greatest enthusiasm was awakened by his
influence, the people were melted into tears, every person listened with
bated breath to his words. Thousands were converted, and among them many of
the most learned of the poets, artists and statesmen of the time. The most
remarkable changes in the modes of life took place, money was restored,
and contributed freely to buy bread when famine threatened, and the
confessional was daily crowded with penitents. One of his biographers says
that "the most remarkable change that was apparent in the manners of the
people, in their recreations and amusements, was the abandonment of
demoralizing practices, of debauchery of all kinds, of profane songs of a
licentious character which the lower grades of the people especially were
greatly addicted to; and the growth of a new taste and passion for
spiritual hymns and sacred poetry that had succeeded that depraved taste."
On one side of his nature, Savonarola seems to have been of a remarkably
pure and noble character, with high aims, noble ambitions and a clear moral
insight. Looked at on its better side, his religious reformation was
wholesome and salutary, and dictated by a genuine desire to elevate worship
and to purify faith. There was a very different side to his life and work,
however, and in some features of his character he seems to have been a
fanatic and enthusiast of the most dangerous sort. He was credulous,
superstitious and visionary. He had no clear, strong and well-reasoned
purpose to which he could hold consistently to the end. An earnest
Catholic, he only sought to reform the Church, not to supersede it; but his
moral aims were not high enough to carry him to the logical results of his
position. Involved by his visionary faith in claims of miraculous power and
supernatural communication, he had not the intellectual honesty to carry
those claims to their legitimate conclusion. Weakness, hesitation and
inconsistency marked his character in his later years, and have made him a
puzzle to modern students. These inconsistencies of character have led to
widely divergent conclusions about the man, his sincerity of purpose and
the outcome of his work.
Another influence of the time, more powerful because more permanent, was
the renaissance movement, which was at this period working its greatest
changes and inspiring the most fervid enthusiasm. A new world had been
disclosed to the people of the fifteenth century in the revival of
knowledge concerning classic literature and art, and there came to be an
absorbing, passionate interest in whatever pertained to the ancients.
Manuscripts were eagerly sought after, translations were diligently made,
literature was modelled after the classic writers, to quote and to imitate
the ancients became the habit of the day. A change the most striking was
produced in the modes of thought and of life. The love of nature was
revived, and with it a graceful abandonment to the dominion of the senses.
Paganism seemed likely to return upon the world again and to reconquer from
Christianity all that it had once lost. The pagan spirit revived, its
tastes and modes of life came back again. Plato was restored to his old
place, and in the minds of the cultured seemed worthier of homage than
Christ. With such as Lorenzo Medici and his literary friends, Platonism was
regarded as a religion.
The recovery of classic literature came to the men of this period as a
revelation. It opened a new world to them, it operated upon them like a
galvanic shock, it kindled the most fervid enthusiasms. It also had the
effect to restore the natural side of life, to liberate men from a false
spiritualism and an excessive idealism. From despising the human faculties,
men came back to an acceptance of their dictation, and even to an animal
delight in the senses and passions. The natural man was deified; but not in
the manner of the Greeks, in simplicity and with a pure love of beauty.
An artificial love of nature and the natural in man was the result of
the renaissance; a hothouse culture and a corrupting moral development
followed. Passion was given loose rein, the senses took every form of
indulgence. Yet the Church was even worse, while many of the classic
scholars were stoic in their moral purity and earnestness. This movement
developed individualism in thought, a selfish moral aim, and intellectual
arrogance. The men who came under its influence cared more for culture
than for humanity, they were driven away from the common interests of
their fellows by their new intellectual sympathies. It was the desire of
Savonarola to restore the old Christian spirit of brotherhood and
helpfulness. In this his movement was wide apart from that of the
renaissance, which gave such tyrants as the Medici a justification for
their deliberate attacks on the liberties of the people. He loved man,
they loved personal development.
George Eliot shows these two influences in antagonism with each other; on
the one hand a reforming Christianity, on the other the renaissance
movement. She admirably contrasts them in their spirit and influence,
though she by no means indicates all of the tendencies of either. Her
purpose is not that of the historical novelist, who wishes simply to give a
correct and living picture of the time wherein he lays his plot. She vises
this portion of history because it furnishes an excellent opportunity to
unfold her ideas about life, rather than because it gives an abundance of
picturesque material to the novelist. Her primary object is not the
interpretation of Florentine life in the time of Savonarola; and this
subordination of the historical material must be kept fully in mind by the
reader or he will be misled in his judgment on the book. It has well been
said that the historical characters in _Romola_ are not so well sketched as
the original creations. Savonarola is not so lifelike as Tito. She seems to
have been cramped by the details of history; and she has not thoroughly
conquered and marshalled subordinate to her thought the mass of local
incidents she introduces. Her account of Savonarola is inadequate, because
it does not enter fully enough into his history, and because it omits much
which is necessary to a full understanding of the man and his influence.
So far as the book has an historical purpose it is that of describing the
general life of the time rather than that of portraying Savonarola. Because
of this purpose much is introduced into the story which is irrelevant to
the plot itself. Not only did the author desire to contrast a man like
Savonarola, led by the spirit of self-denial and renunciation, with one
like Tito Melema led by the spirit of self-love and personal gratification;
but she wished to contrast worldliness and spirituality, or individualism
and altruism, as social forces. Lorenzo and the renaissance give one form
of life, Savonarola and Christianity give another; and these two appear
as affecting every class in society and every phase of the social order.
To bring out this contrast requires a broad stage and many scenes. Much
which seems quite irrelevant to the plot has its place in this larger
purpose, and serves to bring out the final unity of impression which the
author sought to produce. Nor is the purpose of the book merely that of
contrasting two great phases of thought and of social influence, but rather
to show them as permanent elements in human, nature and the nature of the
effect which each produces.
_Romola_ demands for its thorough appreciation that the reader shall have a
considerable acquaintance with Italian history in the fifteenth century and
with the social and literary changes of that period. Whether it is read
with a keen interest and relish will much depend on this previous
information. To the mere novel-reader it may seem dull and too much
encumbered by uninteresting learning. To one who is somewhat familiar with
the renaissance period, and who can appreciate the ethical intention of the
book, it will be found to be a work of genius and profound insight. It will
help such a reader to a clearer comprehension of this period than he could
well obtain in any other manner, and the ethical purpose will add a new and
living interest to the story of Florentine life. He will be greatly helped
to comprehend the moral and intellectual life of the time, with its--
strange web of belief and unbelief; of Epicurean levity and fetichistic
dread; of pedantic impossible ethics uttered by rote, and crude
passions acted out with childish impulsiveness; of inclination toward a
self-indulgent paganism, and inevitable subjection to that human
conscience which, in the unrest of a new growth, was filling the air
with strange prophecies and presentiments. [Footnote: _Proem to
Romola_.]
The artistic features of this period were many and striking, but George
Eliot has not made so large a use of them as could have been wished; at
least they appear in her book too much under the influence of historic
information. She could not be content merely to absorb and reflect an
historic period; but her active intellect, full of ideas concerning the
causes of human changes, must give an explanation of what was before her.
This philosophic tendency mars the artistic effect and blurs the picture
which would otherwise have been given. Yet the critic must not be too sure
of this, and he must be content simply to note that George Eliot was too
energetic a thinker to be willing to portray the picturesque features of
Florentine life in the fifteenth century and to do no more. She had at
least three objects,--to give a picture of Florentine life in the fifteenth
century, to show the influence of the renaissance in conflict with
Christianity, and to inculcate certain ethical ideas about renunciation,
tradition and moral retribution. While the book thus gains in breadth and
in a certain massive impression which it produces, yet it loses in that
concentration of effect which a more limited purpose would have secured. It
gives the impression of having been written by a vigorous thinker rather
than by a genius of the first order. The critic has no right to complain of
this, however, or even to assume that genius might do other work than it
has done. Had George Eliot been less thoughtful than she was, she would not
have been George Eliot. _Romola_ grew out of a genius so large and original
that it can well endure the criticisms caused by any defects it may have.
The ideas of the time appear subtly expressed in the influence they produce
on the persons who entertain them. Savonarola's mysticism and high moral
purpose made him at once a prophet and a reformer, but he was not able to
separate the spiritual realities of life from devotion to his party. His
courage, purity and holiness cannot but be admired, while his fanaticism is
to be deplored. George Eliot has well conceived and expressed the effect
produced in all but the very greatest minds by the assumption of
supernatural powers. Savonarola was strong and great as a preacher and a
reformer, weak only on the side of his visions and his faith that his party
represented the kingdom of God. Not that his visions were weak, nor are
they assumed to be untrue; but his mysticism clouded his intellect, and his
fanaticism led him to overlook the practical truths to be inculcated by a
genuine reformer. He is a true type of the mystical churchman of the time,
who saw the corruption about him and desired a better order of things,
but who hoped to secure it by reviving the past in all its imagined
supernatural features. He would have ruled the world by visions to be
received by monks, and he would have made Jesus Christ the head of the
republic. Yet his visions entangled his clear intellect and perverted his
moral purpose.
On the other hand, Tito Melema was intended to represent the renaissance
movement on its Greek, or its aesthetic and social side. He was not a bad
man at heart, but he had no moral purpose, no ethical convictions. He had
the Greek love of ease, enjoyment and unconcern for the morrow; a spirit
which the renaissance revived in many of its literary devotees. He lived
for the day, for self, in the delight of music, art, social intercourse and
sensual enjoyment. He had the renaissance quickness of assuming all parts,
its love of wide and pretentious learning, its superficial scholarship,
its social and political deftness and flexibility. The dry, minute,
unprofitable spirit of criticism is well indicated by Bardo Bardi, which
had no originality and no fresh vitality, but which loved to comment on the
classic writers at tedious length, and to collate passages for purposes the
most foreign from any practical aim life could possibly afford. In the
conception of Tito, George Eliot has quite surpassed herself, and in all
literature there is no delineation of a character surpassing this. One of
her critics says there is no character in her novels "more subtly devised
or more consistently developed. His serpentine beauty, his winning
graciousness, his aesthetic refinement, his masculine energy of intellect,
his insinuating affectionateness, with his selfish love of pleasure and his
cowardly recoil from pain, his subdulous serenity and treacherous calm, as
of a faithless summer sea, make up a being that at once fascinates and
repels, that invites love, but turns our love into loathing almost before
we have given it." [Footnote: Westminster Review, July, 1881.] Mr. R.H.
Hutton has expressed his conviction that this is one of the most skilfully
painted of all the characters in fictitious literature. He says, "A
character essentially treacherous only because it is full of soft placid
selfishness is one of the most difficult to paint;" but in sketching Tito's
career, "the same wonderful power is maintained throughout, of stamping on
our imagination with the full force of a master hand a character which
seems naturally too fluent for the artist's purpose. There is not a more
masterly piece of painting in English romance than this figure of Tito."