unable to ascertain,--probably between the ages of twenty-one and
twenty-five, by which time she had become a remarkably well-educated
woman, of great conversational powers, interesting because of her
intelligence, brightness, and sensibility, but not for her personal
beauty. In fact, she was not merely homely, she was even ugly; though
many admirers saw great beauty in her eyes and expression when her
countenance was lighted up. She was unobtrusive and modest, and retired
within herself.
At this period she translated from the German the "Life of Jesus," by
Strauss, Feuerbach's "Essence of Christianity," and one of Spinoza's
works. Why should a young woman have selected such books to translate?
How far the writings of rationalistic and atheistic philosophers
affected her own views we cannot tell; but at this time her progressive
and advanced opinions irritated and grieved her father, so that, as we
are told, he treated her with intolerant harshness. With all her
paganism, however, she retained the sense of duty, and was devoted in
her attentions to her father until he died, in 1849. She then travelled
on the Continent with the Brays, seeing most of the countries of Europe,
and studying their languages, manners, and institutions. She resided
longest in a boarding-house near Geneva, amid scenes renowned by the
labors of Gibbon, Voltaire, and Madame de Staël, in sight of the Alps,
absorbed in the theories of St. Simon and Proudhon,--a believer in the
necessary progress of the race as the result of evolution rather than of
revelation or revolution.
Miss Evans returned to England about the year 1857,--the year of the
Great Exhibition,--and soon after became sub-editor of the "Westminster
Review," at one time edited by John Stuart Mill, but then in charge of
John Chapman, the proprietor, at whose house, in the Strand, she
boarded. There she met a large circle of literary and scientific men of
the ultra-liberal, radical school, those who looked upon themselves as
the more advanced thinkers of the age, whose aim was to destroy belief
in supernaturalism and inspiration; among whom were John Stuart Mill,
Francis Newman, Herbert Spencer, James Anthony Froude, G.H. Lewes, John
A. Roebuck, and Harriet Martineau,--dreary theorists, mistrusted and
disliked equally by the old Whigs and Tories, high-churchmen, and
evangelical Dissenters; clever thinkers and learned doubters, but
arrogant, discontented, and defiant.
It was then that the friendly attachment between Miss Evans and Mr.
Lewes began, which ripened into love and ended in a scandal. Mr. Lewes
was as homely as Wilkes, and was three years older than Miss Evans,--a
very bright, witty, versatile, learned, and accomplished man; a
brilliant talker, novelist, playwright, biographer, actor, essayist, and
historian, whose "Life of Goethe" is still the acknowledged authority in
Germany itself, as Carlyle's "Frederic the Great" is also regarded. But
his fame has since been eclipsed by that of the woman he pretended to
call his wife, and with whom (his legal wife being still alive) he lived
in open defiance of the seventh Commandment and the social customs of
England for twenty years. This unfortunate connection, which saddened
the whole subsequent life of Miss Evans, and tinged all her writings
with the gall of her soul, excluded her from that high conventional
society which it has been the aim of most ambitious women to enter. But
this exclusion was not, perhaps, so great an annoyance to Miss Evans as
it would have been to Hannah More, since she was not fitted to shine in
general society, especially if frivolous, and preferred to talk with
authors, artists, actors, and musical geniuses, rather than with
prejudiced, pleasure-seeking, idle patricians, who had such attractions
for Addison, Pope, Mackintosh, and other lights of literature, who
unconsciously encouraged that idolatry of rank and wealth which is one
of the most uninteresting traits of the English nation. Nor would those
fashionable people, whom the world calls "great," have seen much to
attract them in a homely and unconventional woman whose views were
discrepant with the established social and religious institutions of the
land. A class that would not tolerate such a genius as Carlyle, would
not have admired Marian Evans, even if the stern etiquette of English
life had not excluded her from envied and coveted _réunions_; and she
herself, doubtless, preferred to them the brilliant society which
assembled in Mr. Chapman's parlors to discuss those philosophical and
political theories of which Comte was regarded as the high-priest, and
his positivism the essence of all progressive wisdom.
How far the gloomy materialism and superficial rationalism of Lewes may
have affected the opinions of Miss Evans we cannot tell. He was her
teacher and constant companion, and she passed as his wife; so it is
probable that he strengthened in her mind that dreary pessimism which
appeared in her later writings. Certain it is that she paid the penalty
of violating a fundamental moral law, in the neglect of those women
whose society she could have adorned, and possibly in the silent
reproaches of conscience, which she portrayed so vividly in the
characters of those heroines who struggled ineffectually in the conflict
between duty and passion. True, she accepted the penalty without
complaint, and labored to the end of her days, with masculine strength,
to enforce a life of duty and self-renunciation on her readers,--to live
at least for the good of humanity. Nor did she court notoriety, like
Georges Sand, who was as indifferent to reproach as she was to shame.
Miss Evans led a quiet, studious, unobtrusive life with the man she
loved, sympathetic in her intercourse with congenial friends, and
devoted to domestic duties. And Mr. Lewes himself relieved her from many
irksome details, that she might be free to prosecute her intense
literary labors.
In this lecture on George Eliot I gladly would have omitted all allusion
to a mistake which impairs our respect for this great woman. But defects
cannot be unnoticed in an honest delineation of character; and no candid
biographers, from those who described the lives of Abraham and David, to
those who have portrayed the characters of Queen Elizabeth and Oliver
Cromwell, have sought to conceal the moral defects of their subjects.
Aside from the translations already mentioned, the first literary
efforts of Miss Evans were her articles in the "Westminster Review," a
heavy quarterly, established to advocate philosophical radicalism. In
this Review appeared from her pen the article on Carlyle's "Life of
Sterling," "Madame de la Sablière," "Evangelical Teachings," "Heine,"
"Silly Novels by Lady Novelists," "The Natural History of German Life,"
"Worldliness and Unworldliness,"--all powerfully written, but with a
vein of bitter sarcasm in reference to the teachers of those doctrines
which she fancied she had outgrown. Her connection with the "Review"
closed in 1853, when she left Mr. Chapman's home and retired to a small
house in Cambridge Terrace, Hyde Park, on a modest but independent
income. In 1854 she revisited the Continent with Mr. Lewes, spending her
time chiefly in Germany.
It was in 1857 that the first tales of Miss Evans were published in
"Blackwood's Magazine," when she was thirty-eight, in the full maturity
of her mind.
"The Sad Fortunes of Amos Barton" was the first of the series called
"Scenes of Clerical Life" which appeared. Mr. Blackwood saw at once the
great merit of the work, and although it was not calculated to arrest
the attention of ordinary readers he published it, confident of its
ultimate success. He did not know whether it was written by a man or by
a woman; he only knew that he received it from the hand of Mr. Lewes, an
author already well known as learned and brilliant. It is fortunate for
a person in the conventional world of letters, as of society, to be well
introduced.
This story, though gloomy in its tone, is fresh, unique, and
interesting, and the style good, clear, vivid, strong. It opens with a
beautiful description of an old-fashioned country church, with its high
and square pews, in which the devout worshippers could not be seen by
one another, nor even by the parson. This functionary went to church in
top-boots, and, after his short sermon of platitudes, dined with the
squire, and spent the remaining days of the week in hunting or fishing,
and his evenings in playing cards, quietly drinking his ale, and smoking
his pipe. But the hero of the story--Amos Barton--is a different sort of
man from his worldly and easy rector. He is a churchman, and yet
intensely evangelical and devoted to his humble duties,--on a salary of
£80, with a large family and a sick wife. He is narrow, but truly
religious and disinterested. The scene of the story is laid in a retired
country village in the Midland Counties, at a time when the Evangelical
movement was in full force in England, in the early part of last
century, contemporaneous with the religious revivals of New England;
when the bucolic villagers had little to talk about or interest them,
before railways had changed the face of the country, or the people had
been aroused to political discussions and reforms. The sorrows of the
worthy clergyman centered in an indiscreet and in part unwilling
hospitality which he gave to an artful, needy, pretentious, selfish
woman, but beautiful and full of soft flatteries; which hospitality
provoked scandal, and caused the poor man to be driven away to another
parish. The tragic element of the story, however, centres in Mrs.
Barton, who is an angel, radiant with moral beauty, affectionate,
devoted, and uncomplaining, who dies at last from overwork and
privations, and the cares of a large family of children.
There is no plot in this story, but its charm and power consist in a
vivid description of common life, minute but not exaggerated, which
enlists our sympathy with suffering and misfortune, deeply excites our
interest in commonplace people living out their weary and monotonous
existence. This was a new departure in fiction,--a novel without
love-scenes or happy marriages or thrilling adventures or impossible
catastrophes. But there is great pathos in this homely tale of sorrow;
with no attempts at philosophizing, no digressions, no wearisome
chapters that one wishes to skip, but all spontaneous, natural, free,
showing reserved power,--the precious buds of promise destined to bloom
in subsequent works, till the world should be filled with the aroma of
its author's genius. And there is also great humor in this clerical
tale, of which the following is a specimen:--
"'Eh, dear,' said Mrs. Patten, falling back in her chair and lifting up
her withered hands, 'what would Mr. Gilfil say if he was worthy to know
the changes as have come about in the church in these ten years? I don't
understand these new sort of doctrines. When Mr. Barton comes to see me
he talks about my sins and my need of marcy. Now, Mr. Hackett, I've
never been a sinner. From the first beginning, when I went into service,
I've al'ys did my duty to my employers. I was as good a wife as any in
the country, never aggravating my husband. The cheese-factor used to say
that my cheeses was al'ys to be depended upon.'"
To describe clerical life was doubtless the aim which Miss Evans had in
view in this and the two other tales which soon followed. In these, as
indeed in all her novels, the clergy largely figure. She seems to be
profoundly acquainted with the theological views of the different sects,
as well as with the social habits of the different ministers. So far as
we can detect her preference, it is for the Broad Church, or the
"high-and-dry" clergy of the Church of England, especially those who
were half squires and half parsons in districts where conservative
opinions prevailed; for though she was a philosophical radical, she was
reverential in her turn of mind, and clung to poetical and consecrated
sentiments, always laying more stress on woman's _duties_ than on
her _rights_.
The second of the Clerical series--"Mr. Gilfil's Love Story"--is not so
well told, nor is it so interesting as the first, besides being more
after the fashion of ordinary stories. We miss in it the humor of good
Mrs. Patten; nor are we drawn to the gin-and-water-drinking parson,
although the description of his early unfortunate love is done with a
powerful hand. The story throughout is sad and painful.
The last of the series, "Janet's Repentance," is, I think, the best. The
hero is again a clergyman, an evangelical, whose life is one long
succession of protracted martyrdoms,--an expiation to atone for the
desertion of a girl whom he had loved and ruined while in college. Here
we see, for the first time in George Eliot's writings, that inexorable
fate which pursues wrong-doing, and which so prominently stands out in
all her novels. The singular thing is that she--at this time an advanced
liberal--should have made the sinning young man, in the depth of his
remorse, to find relief in that view of Christianity which is expounded
by the Calvinists. But here she is faithful and true to the teaching of
those by whom she was educated; and it is remarkable that her art
enables her apparently to enter into the spiritual experiences of an
evangelical curate with which she had no sympathy. She does not mock or
deride, but seems to respect the religion which she had herself
repudiated.
And the same truths which consoled the hard-working, self-denying curate
are also made to redeem Janet herself, and secure for her a true
repentance. This heroine of the story is the wife of a drunken, brutal
village doctor, who dies of delirium tremens; she also is the slave of
the same degrading habit which destroys her husband, but, unlike him, is
a victim of remorse and shame. In her despair she seeks advice and
consolation from the minister whom she had ridiculed and despised; and
through him she is led to seek that divine aid which alone enables a
confirmed drunkard to conquer what by mere force of will is an
unconquerable habit. And here George Eliot--for that is the name she now
goes by--is in accord with the profound experience of many.
The whole tale, though short, is a triumph of art and abounds with acute
observations of human nature. It is a perfect picture of village life,
with its gossip, its jealousies, its enmities, and its religious
quarrels, showing on the part of the author an extraordinary knowledge
of theological controversies and the religious movements of the early
part of the nineteenth century. So vivid is her description of rural
life, that the tale is really an historical painting, like the Dutch
pictures of the seventeenth century, to be valued as an accurate
delineation rather than a mere imaginary scene. Madonnas, saints, and
such like pictures which fill the churches of Italy and Spain, works of
the old masters, are now chiefly prized for their grace of form and
richness of coloring,--exhibitions of ideal beauty, charming as
creations, but not such as we see in real life; George Eliot's novels,
on the contrary, are not works of imagination, like the frescos in the
Sistine Chapel, but copies of real life, like those of Wilkie and
Teniers, which we value for their fidelity to Nature. And in regard to
the passion of love, she does not portray it, as in the old-fashioned
novels, leading to fortunate marriages with squires and baronets; but
she generally dissects it, unravels it, and attempts to penetrate its
mysteries,--a work decidedly more psychological than romantic or
sentimental, and hence more interesting to scholars and thinkers than to
ordinary readers, who delight in thrilling adventures and exciting
narrations.
The "Scenes of Clerical Life" were followed the next year by "Adam
Bede," which created a great impression on the cultivated mind of
England and America. It did not create what is called a "sensation." I
doubt if it was even popular with the generality of readers, nor was the
sale rapid at first; but the critics saw that a new star of
extraordinary brilliancy had arisen in the literary horizon. The unknown
author entered, as she did in "Janet's Repentance," an entirely new
field, with wonderful insight into the common life of uninteresting
people, with a peculiar humor, great power of description, rare felicity
of dialogue, and a deep undertone of serious and earnest reflection. And
yet I confess, that when I first read "Adam Bede," twenty-five years
ago, I was not much interested, and I wondered why others were. It was
not dramatic enough to excite me. Many parts of it were tedious. It
seemed to me to be too much spun out, and its minuteness of detail
wearied me. There was no great plot and no grand characters; nothing
heroic, no rapidity of movement; nothing to keep me from laying the book
down when the dinner-bell rang, or when the time came to go to bed. I
did not then see the great artistic excellence of the book, and I did
not care for a description of obscure people in the Midland Counties of
England,--which, by the way, suggests a reason why "Adam Bede" cannot be
appreciated by Americans as it is by the English people themselves, who
every day see the characters described, and hear their dialect, and know
their sorrows, and sympathize with their privations and labors. But
after a closer and more critical study of the novel I have come to see
merits that before escaped my eye. It is a study, a picture of humble
English life, painted by the hand of a master, to be enjoyed most by
people of critical discernment, and to be valued for its rare fidelity
to Nature. It is of more true historical interest than many novels which
are called historical,--even as the paintings of Rembrandt are more
truly historical than those of Horace Vernet, since the former painted
life as it really was in his day. Imaginative pictures are not those
which are most prized by modern artists, or those pictures which make
every woman look like an angel and every man like a hero,--like those of
Gainsborough or Reynolds,--however flattering they may be to those who
pay for them.
I need not dwell on characters so well known as those painted in "Adam
Bede." The hero is a painstaking, faithful journeyman carpenter,
desirous of doing good work. Scotland and England abound in such men,
and so did New England fifty years ago. This honest mechanic falls in
love with a pretty but vain, empty, silly, selfish girl of his own
class; but she had already fallen under the spell of the young squire of
the village,--a good-natured fellow, of generous impulses, but
essentially selfish and thoughtless, and utterly unable to cope with his
duty. The carpenter, when he finds it out, gives vent to his wrath and
jealousy, as is natural, and picks a quarrel with the squire and knocks
him down,--an act of violence on the part of the inferior in rank not
very common in England. The squire abandons his victim after ruining her
character,--not an uncommon thing among young aristocrats,--and the girl
strangely accepts the renewed attentions of her first lover, until the
logic of events compels her to run away from home and become a vagrant.
The tragic and interesting part of the novel is a vivid painting of the
terrible sufferings of the ruined girl in her desolate wanderings, and
of her trial for abandoning her infant child to death,--the inexorable
law of fate driving the sinner into the realms of darkness and shame.
The story closes with the prosaic marriage of Adam Bede to Dinah
Morris,--a Methodist preacher, who falls in love with him instead of his
more pious brother Seth, who adores her. But the love of Adam and Dinah
for one another is more spiritualized than is common,--is very
beautiful, indeed, showing how love's divine elements can animate the
human soul in all conditions of life. In the fervid spiritualism of
Dinah's love for Adam we are reminded of a Saint Theresa seeking to be
united with her divine spouse. Dinah is a religious rhapsodist, seeking
wisdom and guidance in prayer; and the divine will is in accordance with
her desires. "My soul," said she to Adam, "is so knit to yours that it
is but a divided life if I live without you."
The most amusing and finely-drawn character in this novel is a secondary
one,--Mrs. Poyser,--but painted with a vividness which Scott never
excelled, and with a wealth of humor which Fielding never equalled. It
is the wit and humor which George Eliot has presented in this inimitable
character which make the book so attractive to the English, who enjoy
these more than the Americans,--the latter delighting rather in what is
grotesque and extravagant, like the elaborate absurdities of "Mark
Twain." But this humor is more than that of a shrewd and thrifty
English farmer's wife; it belongs to human nature. We have seen such
voluble sharp, sagacious, ironical, and worldly women among the
farm-houses of New England, and heard them use language, when excited or
indignant, equally idiomatic, though not particularly choice. Strike out
the humor of this novel and the interest we are made to feel in
commonplace people, and the story would not be a remarkable one.
"Adam Bede" was followed in a year by "The Mill on the Floss," the scene
of which is also laid in a country village, where are some well-to-do
people, mostly vulgar and uninteresting. This novel is to me more
powerful than the one which preceded it,--having more faults, perhaps,
but presenting more striking characters. As usual with George Eliot, her
plot in this story is poor, involving improbable incidents and
catastrophes. She is always unfortunate in her attempts to extricate her
heroes and heroines from entangling difficulties. Invention is not her
forte; she is weak when she departs from realistic figures. She is
strongest in what she has seen, not in what she imagines; and here she
is the opposite of Dickens, who paints from imagination. There was never
such a man as Pickwick or Barnaby Rudge. Sir Walter Scott created
characters,--like Jeannie Deans,--but they are as true to life as Sir
John Falstaff.
Maggie Tulliver is the heroine of this story, in whose intellectual
developments George Eliot painted herself, as Madame De Staël describes
her own restless soul-agitations in "Delphine" and "Corinne." Nothing in
fiction is more natural and life-like than the school-days of Maggie,
when she goes fishing with her tyrannical brother, and when the two
children quarrel and make up,--she, affectionate and yielding; he,
fitful and overbearing. Many girls are tyrannized over by their
brothers, who are often exacting, claiming the guardianship which
belongs only to parents. But Maggie yields to her obstinate brother as
well as to her unreasonable and vindictive father, governed by a sense
of duty, until, with her rapid intellectual development and lofty
aspiration, she breaks loose in a measure from their withering
influence, though not from technical obligations. She almost loves
Philip Wakem, the son of the lawyer who ruined her father; yet out of
regard to family ties she refuses, while she does not yet repel, his
love. But her real passion is for Stephen Gurst, who was betrothed to
her cousin, and who returned Maggie's love with intense fervor.
"Why did he love her? Curious fools, be still!
Is human love the fruit of human will?"
She knows she ought not to love this man, yet she combats her
passion with poor success, allows herself to be compromised in her
relations with him, and is only rescued by a supreme effort of
self-renunciation,--a principle which runs through all George Eliot's
novels, in which we see the doctrines of Buddha rather than those of
Paul, although at times they seem to run into each other. Maggie erred
in not closing the gate of her heart inexorably, and in not resisting
the sway of a purely "physiological law." The vivid description of this
sort of love, with its "strange agitations" and agonizing ecstasies,
would have been denounced as immoral fifty years ago. The _dénouement_
is an improbable catastrophe on a tidal river, in the rising floods of
which Maggie and her brother are drowned,--a favorite way with the
author in disposing of her heroes and heroines when she can no longer
manage them.